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FOREIGN LANGUAGES PUBLISHING HOUSE
Contents
Page V.MOLOTOV. OPENING SPEECH............... 1
J. STALIN. REPORT ON THE WORK OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE
TO THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.) .... 7
I. The Soviet Union and International Affairs........ 8
1. New Economic Crisis in the Capitalist Countries. Intensification
of the Struggle for Markets and Sources of Raw Material, and
for a New Redivision of the World......... 9
2. Aggravation of the International Political Situation. Collapse of the Post-War System of Peace Treaties. Beginning of .a New Imperialist War................. 12
3. The Soviet Union and the Capitalist Countries ..... 17
II. Internal Affairs of the Soviet Union...........19
1. Further Progress of Industry and Agriculture......20
2. Further Rise in the Material and Cultural Standard of the People 29
3. Further Consolidation of the Soviet System ....... 32
III. Further Strengthening of the C.P.S.U.(B.)........36
1. Measures to Improve the Composition of the Party. Division of
Organizations. Closer Contact Between the Leading Party Bodies
and the Work of the Lower Bodies.........37
2. Selection, Promotion and Allocation of Cadres......39
3. Party Propaganda. Marxist-Leninist Training of Party
Members and Party Cadres ..............41
4. Some Questions of Theory............. 44
D. MANUILSKY. REPORT OF THE DELEGATION OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.) IN THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL TO THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.) 57
I. Changes in the International Situation . . . . ,..... 59
Events of the Past Five Years in the Capitalist World..... 60
II. The Struggle of the Communist Parties for the United Front and Popular Front................... 67
III. The Communist Movement in the Capitalist Countries.....80
A. Some Questions of Communist Party Tactics...... 80
B. The Condition of the Communist Parties....... 83
C. The Road of Struggle of the Communist Parties and the Working People Against World Reaction.......... 93
Twenty Years Along the Path of Lenin and Stalin......97
vPage
V MOLOTOV. THE THIRD FIVE-YEAR PLAN FOR THE NATIONALECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF THE U.S.S.R......... 101
I. Results o/, the Second Five-Year Plan.......... 102
II. The Chief Economic Task of the U.S.S.R.......... 112
III. The Plan for the Further Advancement of Our National Economy 119
1. Industry ................... 121
2. Agriculture.......'............ 126
3. Transportation and Postal, Telegraph and Telephone Communication.................... 130
4. Capital Construction............... 131
5. OUT Reserves and Potentialities........... 137
IV. Plan for a Further Rise in ihe Material and Cultural Standard of
the Working People................ 142
V. Significance of the Third Five-Year Plan......... 152
SPEECH IN REPLY TO THE DISCUSSION.......... 158
A. ZHDANOV. AMENDMENTS TO THE RULES OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.) . . 173
Introduction.................... 175
Abolition of the Categories of Admission to the Party .... 180
Rights of Party Members............... 185
Abolition of Mass Purges .............. 188
Mastering or Accepting the Party Program........ 199
Inner-Party Democracy............... 200
Selection of Cadres. Checking the Fulfilment of Decisions. Promotion of New Party Workers............ 204
Remedying the Theoretical .and Political Deficiencies of Cadres 209
Reconstruction of the Party Apparatus. All-Union Conferences 212
The Duties of Primary Organizations in Industry and in Soviet
Institutions.................... 214
Summary of the Discussion of the Theses of the Report on
``Amendments to the Rules of the C.P.S.U.(B.)" ....... 220
A. ANDREYEV. SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
C.P.S.U.(B.)...................... 235
Some Problems of Organizational Work......... 240
Our Tasks in Agriculture............... 245
Discipline and the Question of Organizing Work on the Collective Farms................... 258
Leadership in the Sphere of Agriculture and the Collective Farms 263
K. VOROSHILOV. SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
C.P.S.U.(B.)..................... 269
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army.......... 274
Personnel..................... 283
Material and Cultural Conditions in the Red Army..... 288
The Air and Chemical Defence Society and Other Public Organizations...................... 289
Political Education of the Red Army........... 290
Military/ Training of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army . . 293
Political and Moral State of the Red Army ........ 296
viPage
L. KAGANOVICH. SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
C.P.S.U.(B.)........................301
Consolidation of the Economic Might of the Soviet State . . . 305
Industrial Progress and the Fulfilment of the Task Set by
Comrade Stalin of Outstripping the Principal Capitalist Countries
Economically....................305
Complete Mastery and Expansion of Productive Capacities---a
Cardinal Task...................309
Further Development of the Fuel Industry.........318
Progress of the Fuel Industry.............318
Progress in the Oil Industry..............326
The Railways Have Become One of the Foremost Branches of
Our National Economy................330
Measures'for the Further Improvement of the Railways .... 336
Railwaymen's Rising Standard of Living. Political Work On the
Railways.....................341
Checking Fulfilment and Selection of Cadres........346
Comrade Stalin's Report Is a Great Fighting Program For the Transition from Socialism to the Higher Phase of Communism . . . 350
M. KALININ: SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
C.P.S.U.(B-)......................353
A. MIKOYAN. SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
C.P.S.U.(B.)..................... 361
Questions of Production of Consumers' Goods and Questions
of Trade..................... 364
Questions of Foreign Trade............... 373
Selection of Personnel and Check on Fulfilment ....... 377
N. KHRUSHCHOV. SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
C.P.S.U.(B.)...................., . 381
L. BEKIA. SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
^C.P.S.U.(B-).....................391
N. SHVERNIK. SPEECH AT THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE
C.P.S.U.(B.).....................399
RESOLUTIONS
Resolution of the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.) on the Report of Comrade Stalin on the Work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) .................410
Resolution of the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.) on the Report of the Central Auditing Commission.........411
Resolution of the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.) on the Report of Comrade Manuilsky on the Work of the Delegation of the C.P.S.U.(B.) in the Executive Committee of the Communist International....................411
THE THIRD FIVE-YEAR PLAN FOR THE NATIONAL-ECONOMIC
DEVELOPMENT OF THE U.S.S.R. (1938-1942).........412
Resolution of the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.) on the
Report of Comrade V. Molotov.............412
I. The Results of the Second Five-Year Plan and the Chief Tasks of the Third Five-Year Plan...............412
viiPage
II. Plan of Increase in Output During the Third Five-Year Period . . 419
III. New Construction and Its Distribution During the Third Five-Year Plan Period...................432
IV. The Plan for the Further Rise in the Material and Cultural Standard
of Wie People During tte Third Five-Year Period...... 441
AMENDMENTS TO THE RULES OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.)
Resolution of the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.) on the
Report of Comrade A. Zhdanov............. 447
I. Party Members and Their Rights and Duties........ 457
II. Candidate Members................. 458
III. Organizational Structure of the Party.......... 459
IV. Central Institutions of the Party ............ 460
V. Length of Party Membership Required of Secretaries of Regional Committees, City Committees and District Committees, and of Chiefs of Political Departments of the Red Army and Navy . . . 461
VI. Territorial, Regional, and Republican Party Organizations. . . . 402
VII. Area Party Organizations.............. 462
VIII. City and District (Rural and Urban) Party Organizations . . . 162
IX. Party Organizations in the Red Army and Navy ........ 463
X. Primary Party Organizations............. 463
XI. The Party and the Young Communist League....... 464
Special Decision.................. 464
RULES OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF THE SOVIET UNION
(BOLSHEVIKS) Section of the Communist International...... . 465
I. Party Members, Their Duties and Rights......... 466
II. Candidate Members................. 468
III. Organizational Structure of the Party. Inner-Party Democracy . . 469
IV. Higher Party Organs.................472
V. The Regional, Territorial and Republican Party Organizations . . ,474
VI. Area Party Organizations................476
VII. City and District (Rural and Urban) Party Organizations .... 477 VIII. Primary Party Organizations .............478
IX. The Party and the Young Communist-League........ 480
X. Party Organizations in the Red Army and Navy and in the Transport
System..................... 481
XI. Party Groups in Non-Party Organizations......... 481
XII. Penalties for Violation- of Party Discipline.........482
XIII. Party Funds ...................483
COMPOSITION OF THE COMMISSION TO REVISE THE PROGRAM
OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.) ELECTED BY THE EIGHTEENTH PARTY
CONGRESS.......................484
COMPOSITION OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.)
ELECTED BY THE EIGHTEENTH PARTY CONGRESS......485
COMPOSITION OF THE CENTRAL AUDITING COMMISSION ELECTED
BY THE EIGHTEENTH PARTY CONGRESS..........487
PLENARY MEETING OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.) /......................488
viii __ALPHA_LVL1__ V. MOLOTOVComrades: Our Party has come to the present Congress crowned with victories historic in tlieir importance.
In place of the old state, which was backward even according to capitalist standards, a new state, a new system of society, has been created---Socialism has been built in its essentials. We ousted the landlords and capitalists long ago, but it was only during the last several years that we finally purged our country of all and sundry exploiters. A new society has been established equipped with the most modern technique. There has taken shape a socialist state of workers and peasants which is mounting aloft, is marching onward to the complete victory of communism along the tried and true road of Bolshevism. And this at a time when capitalism seeks salvation in fascism, accursed of all the partisans of human progress, when capitalism, corroded by crises, rotteto to the core because of its parasitic nature, embroils Europe and Asia more and more in a new imperialist world war.
It is with feelings of joy and gladness that the working people of the Soviet Union greet our Congress. These feelings are near and dear to our hearts and our minds. These feelings are begotten of the great battles we have fought and of the moral and political unity that has come about in our country, They are the outcome of the great friendship among the peoples of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, who are welded together into a grand army of communism ready to fight new battles under the banner of Lenin and Stalin. (Applause. All rise.)
We have finished one more historical stage of the Communist Revolution in the U/S.S.R. We have, in the main, brought to completion an entire epoch in our developmental work so that we can now enter upon a new epoch, the epoch of gradual transition from socialism to communism.
Our experience, the experience of the builders of communist society, has already demonstrated in full that the possibilities of growth of the 3 forces of tlie U.S.S.R. are unlimited. Today all conditions have been established in our country to make it possible for the creative activity of the people to burst forth in full bloom throughout the vast expanse of the multi-national Soviet Union, to make it possible for the wellbeing of the people to increase with each passing day, for the cultural progress of the Land of Socialism to develop far and wide.
At the same time the experience of the last few years has shown that the hostile forces without had been underrated by us to a certain extent, that their pernicious activity and subtlety in the struggle against the U.S.S.R. had been underestimated. Things went so far that our external foes in the camp of 'Capitalism devised a sort of intervention in our internal affairs. This peculiar intervention in -Soviet affairs consisted in attempts by several imperialist powers, particularly the fascist powers, to bring in and plant their agents in the various governmental organs of the ILS.S.R. As a matter of fact they wanted to apply to the Soviet Union their rich experience in dealing with some of the weaker bourgeois states where at times the higher seats of government are occupied and affairs of state decided by none other than paid agents and spies of big foreign powers. However impudent on their part, yet it is a fact that such attempts were also made with regard to the Soviet Union through people who but yesterday covered up their vile perfidy and treason with the Communist Party membership card they carried. And this 'will go on in future if we do not reply to the cunning and adroitness of the foreign espionage services by cunning and adroitness twice and even ten times as effective---the cunning and adroitness of the Soviet Intelligence Service. (Applause.)
As you know, the machinations of the class enemy abroad, in the camp of capitalism, particularly the camp of fascism, have been completely frustrated by us. Their new, espionage method of intervention, in which all these Trotskys, Rykovs, Bukharins, Zinovievs, Tukhachevskys, Radeks, Ikramovs and Lubchenkos played the contemptible role of wrecker stool pigeons and filthy agents of foreign espionage services, has suffered complete shipwreck.
We learnt a new lesson on the subject of the state and had the new and rich experience of seeing .the poison of faithlessness employed as a method in the struggle against the Soviet power. We retaliated by resolutely strengthening in Bolshevik fashion the, Soviet state, the Red Army and all other combat organizations of the state, as well as by intensifying the struggle against fascism and its agents. (Applause.)
The new phase we have entered confronts us with new tasks.
4As for our internal problems, main stress must now be laid on educational questions, questions of communist education, the task of doing away with the survivals of capitalism, which are still so much alive in the 'minds of the people.
We are mapping out new plans for the expansion of the national economy, new plans for the growth of the well-being of the people and for an improvement in the cultural level of the working people in every respect.
We have done much to strengthen the Party ideologically and organizationally, to further enhance the fighting qualities of our Party organizations.
In order that our political, our economic, our cultural, our organizational and all our other vast potentialities may be actually realized and practically applied so as to yield a maximum of results in the interest of the people, we must in the present period above all advance the cause of communist education. In order to achieve still greater success in solving any organizational problem that may be involved in increasing the might of our state, and in order to make still more rapid progress in carrying out the fundamental economic task of the Soviet Union, the task of overtaking and surpassing in a short period of time the most developed capitalist countries also economically, we must stress the importance of educating the masses to become communist-minded in their attitude toward work, the importance of further improving the ideological education of the personnel of the Party and state apparatus, and of the whole -Soviet intelligentsia, in the spirit of Marxism-Leninism, in the spirit of Bolshevism.
The present Congress will give rise to a new upsurge in all our work, to a new advance in the cause of communist education and in theoretical research work. Our congresses have always shed much light on Party problems that have become ripe for action; they always represented important stages in raising the communist consciousness of the 'masses, in the communist education of the working people.
No enemy can now break down our Soviet Union. Any aggressor attempting to do so will only break his brazen head against our Soviet boundary posts. (Loud applause.)
Whomever our frank warnings do not suffice, will get to know this at the appropriate hour. The greater our efforts to promote communist education in our country, and the more fruitful our work in this sphere, the greater, the more signal will be our victories, viewed internationally, in this impending struggle with the forces of foreign aggression.
5Comrades, permit me to express the conviction that the Eighteenth Congress will play its historical role also in this respect. Of this we are assured by the forward march in our country of the working class and the whole people under the lofty, victorious banner of the Party of Lenin and Stalin. (All rise. Applause.)
Of this we are assured by the fact that our Party is led onward by the great organizer of the glorious victories of communism, the great inspirer of the communist education of the masses, our Stalin. (All rise. Applause and cheers. Shouts of: "Long Hue Comrade Stalin!")
Comrades, 1,574 delegates with vote have been elected to the Congress, of whom 1,567 are present. In view of this permit me, by direction of the Central Committee of the Party,, to declare the Eighteenth Party Congress open.
6 ~
__ALPHA_LVL1__
J. STALIN
Comrades, five years have elapsed since the Seventeenth Party Congress. No small period, as you see. During this period the world has undergone considerable changes. States and countries, and their mutual relations, are now in many respects totally altered.
What changes exactly have taken place in the international situation in this period? In what way exactly have the foreign and internal affairs of our country changed?
For the capitalist countries this period was one of very profound perturbations in both the economic and political spheres. In the economic sphere these were years of depression, followed, from the beginning of the latter half of 1937, by a period of new economic crisis, of a new decline of industry in the United States, Great Britain and France; consequently, these were years of new eco^mic complications. In the political sphere they were years of serious political conflicts and perturbations. A new imperialist war is already in its second year, a war waged over a huge territory stretching from Shanghai to Gibraltar and involving over five hundred million people. The map of Europe, Africa and Asia is being forcibly re-drawn. The entire post-war system, the so-called regime of peace, has been shaken to its foundations.
For the Soviet Union, on the contrary, these were years of growth and prosperity, of further economic and cultural progress, of further development of political and military might, of struggle for the preservation of peace throughout the world.
Such is the general picture.
Let us now examine the concrete data illustrating the changes in the international situation.
8The economic crisis which broke out in the capitalist countries in the latter half of 1929 lasted until the end of 1933. After that the crisis passed into a depression, and was then followed by a certain revival, a certain upward trend of industry. But this upward trend of industry did not develop into a boom, as is usually the case in a period of revival. On the contrary, in the latter half of 1937 a new economic crisis began which seized the United States first of all and then England, France and a number of other countries.
The capitalist countries thus found themselves faced with a new economic crisis before they had even recovered from the ravages of the recent one.
This circumstance naturally led to an increase of unemployment. The number of unemployed in capitalist countries, which had fallen from thirty million in 1933 to< fourteen million in 1937, has now again risen to eighteen million as a result of the new economic crisis.
A distinguishing feature of the new crisis is that it differs in many respects from the preceding one, and, moreover, differs for the worse and not for the better.
Firstly, the new crisis did not begin after an industrial boom, as was the case in 1929, but after a depression and a certain revival, which, however, did not develop into a boom. This means that the present crisis will be more severe and more difficult to cope with than the previous crisis.
Further, the present crisis has broken out not in time of peace, but at a time when a second imperialist war has already begun; at a time when Japan, already in the second year of her war with China, is disorganizing the immense Chinese market and rendering it almost inaccessible to the goods of other countries; when Italy and Germany have already placed their national economy on a war footing, squandering their reserves of raw material and foreign currency for this purpose; and when all the other big capitalist powers are beginning to reorganize themselves on a war footing. This means that capitalism will have far less resources at its disposal for a normal way out of the present crisis than during the preceding crisis.
Lastly, as distinct from the preceding crisis, the present crisis is not a general one, but as yet involves chiefly the economically powerful countries which have not yet placed themselves on a war 9 economy basis. As regards the aggressive countries, such as Japan, Germany and Italy, who have already reorganized their economy on a war footing, they, because of the intense development of their war industry, are not yet experiencing a crisis of overproduction, although they are approaching it. This means that by the time the economically powerful, non-aggressive countries begin to emerge from the phase of crisis the aggressive countries, having exhausted their reserves of gold and raw material in the course of the war fever, are bound to enter a phase of very severe crisis.
This is clearly illustrated, for example, by the figures for the visible gold reserves of the capitalist countries.
Visible Gold Reserves of the Capitalist Countries
(In millions of former gold dollars)
End of
1936 Total........ 12,980
September 1938 14,301 8,126 2,396 1,435 595 318 407 17 124 97
U.S.A. . .
.
Great Britain
France
Holland .
Belgium .
.
Switzerland
Germany
Italy . .
Japan .
6,649
2,029
1,769
This table shows that the combined gold reserves of Germany, Italy and Japan are less than the reserves of Switzerland alone.
Here are a few figures illustrating the state of crisis of industry in the capitalist countries during the past five years and the trend of industrial progress in the U.S.S.R.
Volume of Industrial Output Compared with 1929
(1929=100)
1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 U.S.A ......
66.4
75.6
88-1
92.2
72.0
Great Britain .....
98.8
105.8
115.9
123.7
112.0
France ....
71.0
67.4
79.3
88.8
70.0
Italy .......
80.0
93.8
87.5
99.6
•96.0
Germany ...
79.8
94.0 .
108.3
117.2
125.0
Japan ........
128.7
141.8
151.1
170.8
165.0
U.S.S.R .....
238.3
293.4
382.3
424.0
477.0
This table shows that the Soviet Union is the only country in the world where crises are unknown and where industry is continuously on the upgrade.
This table also shows that a serious economic crisis has already begun and is developing in the United States, Great Britain and France.
Further, this table shows that in Italy and Japan, who placed their national economy on a war footing earlier than Germany, the downward course of industry already began in 1938.
Lastly, this table shows that in Germany, who reorganized her economy on a war footing later than Italy and Japan, industry is still experiencing a certain upward trend---although, a small one, it is true---corresponding to that which took place in Japan and Italy until recently.
There can be no doubt that unless something unforeseen occurs, German industry must enter the same downward path as Japan and Italy have already taken. For what does placing the economy of a country on a war footing mean? It 'means giving industry a one-sided, war direction; developing to the utmost the production of goods necessary for war and not for consumption by the population; restricting to the utmost the production and, especially, the sale of articles of general consumption---and, consequently, reducing consumption by the population and confronting the country with an economic crisis.
Such is the concrete picture of the trend of the new economic crisis in the capitalist countries.
Naturally, such an unfavourable turn of economic affairs could not but aggravate relations between the powers. The preceding crisis had already mixed the cards and intensified the struggle for markets and sources of raw materials. The seizure of Manchuria and North China by Japan, the seizure .of Abyssinia by Italy---all this reflected the acuteness of the struggle among the powers. The new economic crisis must lead, and is actually leading, to a further sharpening of the imperialist struggle. It is no longer a question of competition in the markets, of /a commercial war, of dumping. These methods of struggle have long been recognized as inadequate. It is now a question of a new redivision of the world, of spheres of influence and colonies, by military action.
Japan tried to justify her aggressive actions by the argument that she had been cheated when the Nine-Power Pact was concluded and had not been allowed to extend her territory at the expense of 11 China, whereas Britain and France possess enormous colonies. Italy recalled that she had been cheated during the division of the spoils after the first imperialist war and that she must recompense herself at the expense of the spheres of influence of Britain and France. Germany, who had suffered severely as a result of the first imperialist war and the Peace of Versailles, joined forces with Japan and Italy, and demanded an extension of her territory in Europe and the return of the colonies of which the victors in the first imperialist war had deprived her.
Thus the bloc of three aggressor states came to be formed.
A new redivision of the world by means of war became imminent.
Here is a list of the most important events during the period under review which mark the beginning of the new imperialist war. In 1935 Italy attacked and seized Abyssinia. In the summer of 1936 Germany and Italy organized military intervention in Spain, Germany entrenching herself in the north of Spain and in Spanish Morocco, and Italf in the south of Spain and in the Balearic Islands. Having seized Manchuria, Japan in 1937 invaded North and Central China, occupied Peking, Tientsin and Shanghai and began to oust her foreign competitors from the occupied zone. In the beginning of 1938 Germany seized Austria, and in the autumn of 1938 the Sudeten region of Czechoslovakia. At the end of 1938 Jap.an seized Canton, and at the beginning of 1939 the Island of Hainan.
Thus the war, which has stolen so imperceptibly upon the nations, has drawn over five hundred million people into its orbit and has extended its sphere of action over a vast territory, stretching from Tientsin, Shanghai and Canton, through Abyssinia, to Gibraltar.
After the first imperialist war the victor states, primarily Britain, France and the United States, had set up a new regime in the relations between countries, the post-war regime of peace. The main props of this regime were the Nine-Power Pact in the Far East, and the Versailles Treaty and a number of other treaties in Europe. The League of Nations was set up to regulate relations between countries within the framework of this regime, on the basis of a united front of states, of'collective defence of the security of states. However, three 12 aggressive states, and the new imperialist war launched by them, have upset the entire system of this post-war peace regime. Japan tore up th*e Nine-Power Pact, and Germany and Italy the Versailles Treaty. In order to have their hands free, these three states withdrew from the League of Nations.
The new imperialist war became a fact.
It is not so easy in our day to suddenly break loose and plunge straight into war without regard for treaties of any kind or for public opinion. Bourgeois politicians know this very well. So dp the fascist rulers. That is why the fascist rulers decided, before plunging into war, to frame public opinion to suit their ends, that is, to mislead it, to deceive it.
A military bloc of Germany and Italy against the interests of England and France in Europe? Bless us, do you call that a bloc! ``We'' have no military bloc. All ``we'' have is an innocuous " BerlinRome axis"; that is, just a geometrical equation for an axis. (Laughter.)
A military bloc of Germany, Italy and Japan against the interests of the United States, Great Britain and France in the Far East? Nothing of the kind! ``We'' have no military bloc. All ``we'' have is an innocuous "Berlin-Rome-Tokyo triangle"; that is, a slight penchant for geometry. (General laughter.)
A war against the interests of England, France, the United States? Nonsense! ``We'' are waging war on the Comintern, not on these states. If,you don't believe it, read the "anti-Comintern pact" concluded between Italy, Germany and Japan.
That is how Messieurs the aggressors thought of framing public opinion, although it was not hard to see how preposterous this whole clumsy game of camouflage was; for it is ridiculous to look for Comintern ``hotbeds'' in the deserts of Mongolia, in the mountains of Abyssinia, or in the wilds of Spanish Morocco. (Laughter.)
But war is inexorable. It cannot be hidden under any guise. For no "axes," ``triangles'' or "anti-Comintern pacts" can hide the fact that in this period Japan has seized a vast stretch of territory in China, that Italy has seized Abyssinia, that Germany has seized Austria and the Sudeten region, that Germany and Italy together have seized Spain---and all this in defiance of the interests of the non-aggressive states. The war remains a war; the military bloc of aggressors remains a military bloc; and the aggressors remain aggressors.
It is a distinguishing feature of the new imperialist war that 13 it has not yet become universal, a world war. The war is being waged by aggressor states, who in every way infringe upon the interests of the non-aggressive states, primarily England, France and the U.S.A., while the latter draw back and retreat, making concession after concession to the aggressors.
Thus we are witnessing an open redivision of the world and spheres of influence at the expense of the non-aggressive states, without the least attempt at resistance, and even with a certain amount of connivance, on the part of the latter.
Incredible, but true.
To what are we to attribute this one-sided and strange character of the new imperialist war?
How is it that the non-aggressive countries, which possess such vast opportunities, have so easily, and without any resistance, abandoned their positions and their obligations to please the aggressors ?
Is it to be attributed to the weakness of the non-aggressive states? Of course not! Combined, the non-aggressive, democratic states are unquestionably stronger than the fascist states, both economically and militarily.
To what then are we to attribute the systematic concessions made by these states to the aggressors?
It might be attributed, for example, to the fear that a revolution might break out if the non-aggressive states were to go to war and the war were to assume world-wide proportions. The i bourgeois politicians know, of course, that the first imperialist world war led to the victory of the revolution in one of the largest countries. They are afraid that the second imperialist world war may also lead to the victory of the revolution in one or several countries.
But at present this is not the sole or even the chief reason. The chief reason is that the majority of the non-aggressive countries, particularly England and France, have rejected the policy of collective security, /the policy of collective resistance to the aggressors, and have taken up a position of non-intervention, a position of "neutrality.''
Formally speaking, the policy of non-intervention might be denned as follows: "Let each country defend itself from the aggressors as it likes and as best it can. That is not our affair. We shall trade both with the aggressors and with their victims." But actually speaking, the policy of non-intervention means conniving at aggression, giving free rein to war, and, consequently, transforming the war into a world war. The policy of non-intervention reveals an 14 eagerness, a desire, not to hinder the aggressors in their nefarious work: not to hinder Japan, say, from embroiling herself in a war with China, or, better still, with the Soviet Union; not to hinder Germany, say, from enmeshing herself in European affairs, from embroiling herself in a war with the Soviet Union; to allow all the belligerents to sink deeply into the mire of war, to encourage them surreptitiously in this; to allow them to weaken and exhaust one another; and then, when they have become weak enough, to appear on the scene with fresh strength, to appear, of course, "in the interests of peace," and to dictate conditions to the enfeebled belligerents.
Cheap and easy!
Take Japan, for instance. It is characteristic that before Japan invaded North China all the influential French and British newspapers shouted about China's weakness and her inability to offer resistance, and declared that Japan with her army could subjugate China in two or three months. Then the European and American politicians began to watch and wait. And then, when Japan started military operations, they let her have Shanghai, the vital centre of foreign capital in China; they let her have Canton, a centre of Britain's monopoly influence in South China; they let her have Hainan, and they allowed her to surround Hongkong. Does not this look very much like encouraging the aggressor? It is as though they were saying: "Embroil yourself deeper in war; then we shall see.''
Or take Germany, for instance. They let her have Austria, despite the undertaking to defend her independence; they let her have the Sudeten region; they abandoned Czechoslovakia to her fate, thereby violating all their obligations; and then they began to lie vociferously in the press about "the weakness of the Russian army," "the demoralization of the Russian air force," and ``riots'' in the Soviet Union, egging the Germans on to march farther east, promising them easy pickings, and prompting them: "Just start war on the Bolsheviks, and everything will be all right." It must be admitted that this too looks very much like egging on and encouraging the aggressor.
The hullabaloo raised by the British, French and American press over the Soviet Ukraine is characteristic. The gentlemen of the press theje shouted until they were hoarse that the Germans were marching on Soviet Ukraine, that they now had what is called the Carpathian Ukraine, with a population of some seven hundred thousand, and that not later than this spring the Germans would annex the Soviet 15 Ukraine, which has a population of over thirty million, to this socalled Carpathian Ukraine. It looks as if the object of this suspicious hullabaloo was to incense the Soviet Union against Germany, to poison the atmosphere and to provoke a conflict with Germany without any visible grounds.
It is quite possible, of course, that there are madmen in Germany who dream of annexing the elephant, that is, the Soviet Ukraine, to the gnat, namely, the so-called Carpathian Ukraine. If there really are such lunatics in Germany, rest assured that we shall find enough strait-jackets for them in our country. (Thunderous applause.) But if we ignore the madmen and turn to normal people, is it not clearly absurd and foolish to seriously talk of annexing the Soviet Ukraine to this so-called Carpathian Ukraine? Imagine: The gnat comes to the elephant and says perkily: "Ah, brother, how sorry I am for you. . . . Here you are without any landlords, without any capitalists, with no national oppression, without any fascist bosses. Is that a way to live? ... As I look at you I can't help thinking that there is no hope for you unless you annex yourself to me. . . . (General laughter.) Well, so be it: I allow you to annex your tiny domain to my vast territories. . . ." (General laughter and applause.) Even more characteristic is the fact that certain European and American politicians and 'pressmen, having lost patience waiting for "the inarch on the Soviet Ukraine," are themselves beginning to disclose what is really behind the policy of non-intervention. They are saying quite openly, putting it down in black on white, that the Germans have cruelly ``disappointed'' them, for instead of marching farther east, against the Soviet Union, they have turned, you see, to the west and are demanding colonies. One might think that the districts of Czechoslovakia were yielded to Germany as the price of an undertaking to launch war on the Soviet Union, but that now the Germans are refusing to meet their bills and are sending them to Hades.
Far be it from me to moralize on the policy of non-intervention, to talk of treason, treachery and so on. It would be naive to preach morals to people who recognize no human morality. Politics is politics, as the old, case-hardened bourgeois diplomats say. It must be remarked, however, that the big and dangerous political game started by the supporters of the policy of non-intervention may end in a serious fiasco for them.
Such is the true face of the prevailing policy of non-intervention. Such is the political situation in the capitalist countries.
16The war has created a new situation with regard to the relations between countries. It has enveloped them in an atmosphere of alarm and uncertainty. By undermining the post-war peace regime and overriding the elementary principles of international law, it has cast doubt on the value of international treaties and obligations. Pacifism and disarmament schemes are dead and buried. Feverish arming has taken their place. Everybody is arming, small states and big states, including primarily those which practise the policy of non-- intervention. Nobody believes any longer in the unctuous speeches which claim that the Munich concessions to the aggressors and the Munich agreement opened a new era of "appeasement." They are disbelieved even by the signatories to the Munich agreement, Britain and France, who are increasing their armaments no less than other countries.
Naturally, the U.S.S.R. could not ignore these ominous events. There is no doubt that any war, however small, started by the aggressors in any remote corner of the world constitutes a danger to the peaceable countries. All the more serious then is the danger arising from the new imperialist war, which has already drawn into its orbit over five hundred million people in Asia, Africa and Europe. In view of this, while our country is unswervingly pursuing a policy of preserving peace, it is at the same time doing a great deal to increase the preparedness of our Red Army and our Red Navy.
At the same time, in order to strengthen its international position, the Soviet Union decided to take certain other steps. At the end of 1934 our country joined the League of Nations, considering that despite its weakness the League might nevertheless serve as a place where aggressors can be exposed, and as a certain instrument of peace, however feeble, that might hinder the outbreak of war. The Soviet Union considers that in alarming times like these even so weak an international organization as the League of Nations should not be ignored. In May 1935 a treaty of mutual assistance against possible attack by aggressors was signed between France and the Soviet Union. A similar treaty was simultaneously concluded with Czechoslovakia. In March 1936 the Soviet Union concluded a treaty of mutual assistance with the Mongolian People's Republic. In August 1937 the Soviet Union concluded a pact of non-aggression with the Chinese Republic.
It was in such difficult international conditions that the Soviet Union pursued its foreign policy of upholding the cause of peace.
The foreign policy of the Soviet Union is clear and explicit.
__PRINTERS_P_17_COMMENT__ 2---263 171. We stand for peace and the strengthening of business relations with all countries. That is our position; and we shall adhere to this position as long as these countries maintain like relations with the Soviet Union, and as long as they make no attempt to trespass on the interests of our country.
2. We stand for peaceful, close and friendly relations with all the neighbouring countries which have common frontiers with the U.S.S.R. That is our position; and we shall adhere to this position as long as these countries maintain like relations with the Soviet Union, and as long as they make no attempt to trespass, directly or indirectly, on the integrity and inviolability of the frontiers of the Soviet state.
3. We stand for the support of nations which are the victims of aggression and are fighting for the independence of their country.
4. We are not afraid of the threats of aggressors, and are ready to deal two blows for every blow delivered by instigators of war who attempt to violate the Soviet borders.
Such is the'foreign policy of the Soviet Union. (Loud and prolonged applause.)
In its foreign policy the Soviet Union relies upon:
1. Its growing economic, political and cultural might;
2. The moral and political unity of our Soviet society;
3. The mutual friendship of the nations of our country;
4. Its Red Army and Red Navy;
5. Its policy of peace;
6. The moral support of the working people of all countries, who are vitally concerned in the preservation of peace;
7. The good sense of the countries which for one reason or another have no interest in the violation of peace.
__*_*_*__The tasks of the Party in the sphere of foreign policy are:
1. To continue the policy of peace and of strengthening business relations with all countries;
2. To be cautious and not allow our country to be drawn into conflicts by warmongers who are accustomed to have others pull the chestnuts out of the fire for them;
3. To strengthen the might of our Red Army and Red Navy to the utmost;
4. To strengthen the international bonds of friendship with the working people of all countries, who are interested in peace and friendship among nations.
18 __NUMERIC_LVL2__ II __ALPHA_LVL2__ INTERNAL AFFAIRS OF THE SOVIET UNIONLet us now pass to the internal affairs of our country.
From the standpoint of its internal situation, the Soviet Union, during the period under review, presented a picture of further progress of its entire economic life, a rise in culture, and the strengthening of the political might of the country.
In the sphere of economic development, we must regard the most important result during the period under review to be the fact that the reconstruction of industry and agriculture, on the basis of a new, modern technique has been completed. There are no more or hardly any more old plants in our country, with their old technique, and hardly any old peasant farms, with their antediluvian equipment. Our industry and agriculture are now based on new, up-to-date technique. It may be said without exaggeration that from the standpoint of the technique of production, from the standpoint of the degree of saturation of industry and agriculture with new machinery, our country is more advanced than any other country, where the old machinery acts as a fetter on production and hampers the introduction of modern technique.
In the sphere of the social and political development of the country, we must regard the most important achievement during the period under review to be the fact that the remnants of the exploiting classes have been completely eliminated, that the workers, peasants and intellectuals have been welded into one common front of the working people, that the moral and political unity of Soviet society has been strengthened, that the friendship among the nations of our country has become closer, and, as a result, that the political life of our country has been completely democratized and a new Constitution created. No one will dare deny that our Constitution is the most democratic in the world, and that the results of the elections to the Supreme Soviet of 19 the U.S.S.R., as well as to the Supreme Soviets of the Union Republics, have been the most exemplary.
The result of all this is a completely stable internal situation and a stability of government which any other government in the world might envy.
Let us examine the concrete data illustrating the economic and political situation of our country.
a) Industry. During the period under review our industry presented a picture of uninterrupted progress. This progress was reflected not only in an increase of output generally, but, and primarily, in the flourishing state of socialist industry, on the one hand, and the doom of private industry, on the other.
Here is a table which illustrates this:
Industrial Progress of the U.S.S.B. in 1934-38
1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938Per cent of previous year
•o
28 *""* U
1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 In millions of rubles
at 1926-27 prices ~
Total output .
42,030
50,477
62,137
80,929
90,166
100,375
120.1
123.1
130.2
111.4
111.3
238.8
Of which:
1. Socialist
industry . .
42,002
50,443
62,114
80,898
90,138
100,349
120.1
123.1
130.2
111.4
111.3
238.9
2. Private
industry . •
121.4
67.6
134.8
90.3
92.9
92.9
Per cent ~
Total output .
100.00
100.00
100.00
100.00
100.00
100.00
Of which:
1. Socialist
industry
99.93
99.93
99.96
99.96
99.97
99.97
2. Private
industry . .
0.07
0.07
0.04
0.04
0.03
0.03
This table shows that during the period under review the output of our industry more than doubled, and that, moreover, the whole increase in output was accounted for by socialist industry.
20Further, this table shows that the only system of industry in the U.S.S.R. is the socialist system.
Lastly, this table .shows that the complete ruin of private industry is a fact which even a blind man cannot now deny.
The ruin of private industry must not be regarded as a thing of chance. Private industry perished, firstly, because the socialist economic system is superior to the capitalist system; and, secondly, because the socialist economic system made it possible for us to reequip in a few years the whole of our socialist industry on new and up-to-date technical lines. This is a possibility which the capitalist economic system does not and cannot offer. It is a fact that, from the standpoint of the technique of production and from the standpoint of the degree of saturation of industry with modern machinery, our industry holds first place in the world.
If we take the rate of growth of our industry, expressed in percentages of the pre-war level, and compare it with the rate of growth of the industry of the principal capitalist countries, we get the following picture:
Growth of Industry in the TJ.S.S.B. and the Principal Capitalist Countries in 1913-38
1913 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 USSR .......
100.0
380.B
457.0
562.6
732.7
816.4
908.8
U S.A ..........
100.0
108.7
112.9
128.6
149.8
156.9
120.0
100.0
87.0
97.1
104.0
114.2
121.9
113.3
]00.0
75.4
90.4
105.9
118.1
129.3
131.6
100.0
107.0
99.0
94.0
98.0
101.0
93.2
This table shows that our industry has grown more than ninefold as compared with pre-war, whereas the industry of the principal capitalist countries continues to mark time round about the pre-war level, exceeding the latter by only 20 or 30 per cent.
This means that as regards rate of growth our socialist industry holds first place in the world.
Thus 'we find that as regards technique of production and rate of growth of our industry, we have already overtaken and outstripped the principal capitalist countries.
In what respect are we lagging? We are still lagging economically, that is, as regards the volume of our industrial output per head of population. In 1938 we produced about 15,000,000 tons of pig iron; 21 Great Britain produced 7,000,000 tons. It might seem that we are better off than Great Britain. But if we divide this number of tons by the number of population we shall find that the output of pig iron per head of population in 1938 was 145 kilograms in Great Britain, and only 87 kilograms in the U.S.S.R. Or, further: in 1938 Great Britain produced 10,800,000 tons of'steel and about 29,000,000,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity, whereas the U.S.S.R. produced 18,000,000 tons of steel and over 39,000,000,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity. It might seem that we are better off than Great Britain. But if we divide this number of tons and kilowatt-hours by the number of population we shall find that in 1938 in Great Britain the output of steel per head of population was 226 kilograms and of electricity 620 kilowatt-hours, whereas in the U.S.S.R. the output of steel per head of population was only 107 kilograms, and of electricity only 233 kilowatt-hours.
What is the reason for this? The reason is that our population is several times larger than that of Great Britain, and hence pur requirements are greater: the Soviet Union has a population of 170,000,000, whereas Great Britain has a population of not more than 46,000,000. The economic power of a country's industry is not expressed by the volume of industrial output in general, irrespective of the size of population, but by the volume of industrial output taken in direct reference to the amount consumed per head of population. The larger a country's industrial output per head of' population, the greater is its economic power; and, conversely, the smaller the output per head of population, the less is the economic power of the country and of its industry. Consequently, the larger a country's population, the greater is the need for articles of consumption, and hence the larger should be the industrial output of the country.
Take, for example, the output of pig iron. In order to outstrip Great Britain economically in respect to the production of pig iron, which in 1938 amounted in that country to 7,000,000 tons, we must increase our annual output of pig iron to 25,000,000 tons. In order economically to outstrip Germany, which in 1938 produced 18,000,000 tons of pig iron in all, we must raise our annual output to 40,000,000 or 45,000,000 tons. And in order to outstrip the U.S.A. economically---not as regards the level of 1938, which was a year of crisis, and in which the U.S.A. produced only 18,800,000 tons of pig iron, but as regards the level of 1929, when the U.S.A. was experiencing an industrial boom and when it produced about 43,000,000 tons of pig iron---we must raise our annual output of pig iron to 50,000,000 or 60,000,000 tons.
22The same must be said of the production of steel and rolled steel, of the machine-building industry, and so on, inasmuch as all these branches of industry, like the other branches, depend in the long run on the production of pig iron.
We have outstripped the principal capitalist countries as regards technique of production and rate of industrial development. That is very good, but it is not enough. We must outstrip them economically as well. We can do it, and we must do it. Only if we outstrip the principal capitalist countries economically can we reckon upon our country being fully saturated with consumers' goods, on having an abundance of products, and on being able to make the transition from the first phase of communism to its second phase.
What do we require to outstrip the principal capitalist countries economically? First of all, we require the earnest and indomitable desire to move ahead and the readiness to make sacrifices and invest very considerable amounts of capital for the utmost expansion of our socialist industry. Have we these requisites? We undoubtedly have! Further, we require a high technique of production and a high rate of industrial development. Have we these requisites? We undoubtedly have! Lastly, we require time. Yes, comrades, time. We must build new factories. We must train new cadres for industry. But this requires time, and no little time at that. We cannot outstrip the principal capitalist countries economically in two or three years. It will require rather more than that. Take, for example, pig iron and its production, to which we have already referred. How much time do we require to outstrip the principal capitalist countries economically in regard to the production of pig iron? When the Second Five-Year Plan was being drawn up, certain members of the old personnel of the State Planning Commission proposed that the annual output of pig iron towards the end of the Second Five-Year Plan should be fixed in the amount of sixty million tons. That means that they assumed the possibility of an average annual increase in pig iron production of ten million tons. This, of course, was sheer fantasy, if not worse. Incidentally, it was not only in regard to the production of pig iron that these comrades indulged their fantasy. They considered, for example, that during the period of the Second Five-Year Plan the annual increase of population in the U.S.S.R. should amount to three or four million persons, or even more. This was also fantasy, if not worse. But if we ignore these fantastic dreamers and come down to reality, we may consider quite feasible an average annual increase in the output of pig iron of two or two and a half million tons, bearing in mind the present state of 23 the technique of iron smelting. The industrial history of the principal capitalist .countries, as well as of our country, shows that such an annual rate of increase involves a great strain, but is quite feasible.
Hence, we require time, and no little time at that, in order to outstrip the principal capitalist countries economically. And the higher our productivity of labour becomes, and the more our technique of production is perfected, the more rapidly can we accomplish this cardinal economic task, and the more can we reduce the period of its accomplishment.
b) Agriculture. Like the development of industry, the development of agriculture during the period under review has followed an upward trend. This upward trend is expressed not only in an increase of agricultural output, but, and primarily, in the growth and consolidation of socialist agriculture on the one hand, and the utter decline of individual peasant farming on the other. Whereas the grain area of the collective farms increased from 75,000,000 hectares in 1933 to 92,000,000 in 1938, the grain area of the individual peasant farmers dropped in this period from 15,700,000 hectares to 600,000 hectares, or to 0.6 per cent of the total grain area. I will not mention the area under industrial crops, a branch where individual peasant farming has been altogether ousted. Furthermore, it is well known that the collective farms now unite 18,800,000 peasant households, or 93.5 per cent of all the peasant households, aside from the collective fisheries and collective trapping and handicraft industries.
This means that the collective farms have been firmly established and consolidated, and that the socialist system of farming is now our only form of agriculture.
If we compare the areas under all crops during the period under review with the crop areas in the pre-revolutionary period, we observe the following picture of growth:
Areas Under All Crops in the U.S.S.R.
Millions of hectares ~
i!i
oo ocoC?
co ft---< d
OT Kf Oi flj
1-4 ftrH U
Total crop area Of which: a) Grain .......
105.0
94.4
4.5
3.8
2J
131.5
104.7
10.7
8.8
7.1
132.8
103.4
10.6
9.9
8.6
133.8
102.4
10.8
9.8
10.6
135.3
104.4
11.2
9.0
10.6
136.9
102.4
11.0
9.4
14.1
130.4
108.5
244.4
247.4
671.4
b) Industrial ....
c) Vegetable ....
d) Fodder ......
This table shows that we have an increase in area for all cultures, and above all for fodder, industrial crops, and vegetables.
This means that our agriculture is becoming more high-grade and productive, and that a solid foundation is being provided for the increasing application of proper crop rotation.
The way our collective farms and state farms have been increasingly supplied with tractors, harvester combines and other machines during the period under review is shown by the following tables:
1) Tractors Employed in Agriculture in the U.S.S.R.
1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 ti
o
u .
£-''.
i'?s ~
I. Number of tractors (thousands) Total .......
210.9
123.2
83.2
3,209.2
1,758.1
1,401.7
276.4
177.3
95. B
4,462.8
2,753.9
1,669.5
360.3
2B4.7
102.1
6,184.0
4,281.6
1,861.4
422.7
328. B
88.5
7,672.4
5,866.0
1,730.7
454.5
365.8
84.5
8,385.0
6,679.2
1,647.5
483.5
394.0
85.0
9,256.2
7,437.0
1,751.8
229.3
319.8
102.2
288.4
423.0
125.0
Of which:
a) In machine and tractor
b) In state farms and
auxiliary agricultural
undertakings .......
II. Power (thous. h.p.)
Of which:
a) In machine and tractor
t») In state farms and
auxiliary agricultural
undertakings .......
2) Total Harvester Combines and Other Machines Employed in
Agriculture in the U.S.S.II.
(In thousands; at end of year)
SCO
o^^01^^
°!q "
CO."£ •
Harvester combines ....
25.4
32.3
50.3
87.8
128.8
153.5
604.3
Internal combustion and
48.0
60.9
69.1
72.4
77.9
83.8
174.6
Complex and semi-complex
grain threshers .....
120.3
121.9
120.1
123.7
126.1
130.8
108.7
Motor trucks .......
26.6
40.3
63.7
96.2
144.5
195.8
736,1
Automobiles (units) . . . .
3,991
5,533
7,555
7,630
8,156
9,594
240.4
If, in addition to these figures, we bear in mind that in the period under review the number of machine and tractor stations increased from 2,900 in 1934 to 6,350 in 1938, it may be safely said that the reconstruction of our agriculture on the basis of a new and up-to-date machine technique has in the main already been completed.
Our agriculture, consequently, is not only run on the largest and most mechanized scale in the world, and therefore produces the largest surplus for the market, but is also more fully equipped with modern machinery than the agriculture of any other country.
If we compare the harvests of grain and industrial crops during the period under review with the pre-revolutionary period, we get the following picture of growth:
Gross Production of Grain and Industrial Crops in the U.S.S.B..
In millions of centners
1938 compared •with 1913 (per cent)
1913 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 801.0
7-4
3.3
109.0
21.5
894.0
11.8
5.3
113.6
36.9
901.0
17.2
6.5
162.1
42.7'
827.3
23.9
5.8
168.3
42.3
1,202.9
25.8
5.7
218.6
51.1
949.9
26.9
5.46
166.8
46.6
118.6
363.5
165.5
153.0
216.7
Flax fibre .......
Sugar beet ' .......
Oil seed ... .....
From this table it can be seen that despite the drought in the eastern and southeastern districts in 1936 and 1938, and despite the unprecedentedly large harvest in 1913, the 'gross production of grain and industrial crops during the period under review steadily increased as Compared with 1913.
Of particular interest is the question of the amount of grain marketed by the collective and state farms as compared with their gross harvests. Comrade Nemchinov, the well-known statistician, has calculated that of a gross grain harvest of 5,000,000,000 poods in pre-war times, only about 1,300,000,000 poods were marketed. Thus the 26 proportion of marketed produce of grain farming /at that time was 26 per cent. Comrade Nemchinov computes that the proportion of marketed produce to gross harvest in the years 1926-27, for example, was about 47 per cent in the case of collective and state farming, which is largescale farming, and about 12 per cent in the case of individual peasant farming. If we approach the matter more cautiously and assume the amount of marketed produce in the case of collective and state farming in 1938 to be 40 per cent of the gross harvest, we find that in that year our socialist grain farming was able to release, and actually did release, about 2,300,000,000 poods of grain for the market, or 1,000,000,000 poods more than was marketed in pre-war times.
Consequently, the high proportion of produce marketed constitutes the most important feature of state and collective farming, and is of cardinal importance for the food supply of our country.
It is this feature of the collective farms and state farms that explains the secret why our country has succeeded so easily and rapidly in solving the grain problem, the problem of producing an adequate supply of market grain for this vast country.
It should be noted that during the last three years our annual state grain collections have not dropped below 1,600,000,000 poods, while sometimes, as for example in 1937, they have reached 1,800,000,000 poods. If we add to this about 200,000,000 poods or so of grain purchased annually by the state, as well as several hundred million poods sold by collective farms and farmers directly in the market, we get in all the total of grain marketed by the collective farms and state farms already mentioned.
Further, it is interesting to note that during the last three years the base of market grain has shifted from the Ukraine, which was formerly considered the granary of our country, to the north and the east, that is, to the R.S.F.S.R. We know that during the last two or three years grain collections in the Ukraine have amounted in all to about 400,000,000 poods annually, whereas in the R.S.F.S.R. the grain collections during these years have amounted to 1,100,000,000 or 1,200,000,000 poods annually.
That is how things stand with regard to grain farming.
As regards livestock farming, considerable progress has been made during the past few years in this, the most backward branch of agriculture, as well. True, in the number of horses and in sheep breeding we are still below the pre-revolutionary level; but as regards cattle and pig breeding we have already passed the pre-revolutionary level.
Here are the figures:
27 Total Head of Livestock in the U.S.S.B.
(In millions)
£
1938 compared
2 OB
with
S 3
~"S3
July
1933
July
1934
July
1935
July
193fi
July
1937 July
1938 1916
accord ing
1933
- 8 a
to
cen(
pei3 0 £
*•= a a
sus (per
cent)
cent)
Horses .... . .
35.8
16.6
15.7
15.9
Ififi
17.5
48.9
105.4
Cattle ........
60.6
38.4
4?,4
49.9
56.7
63.2
104.3
164.6
Sheep and goats . . . .
121.2
50.2
51.9
61.1
73.7
81.3
102.5
84.6
204.2
Piss ........
20.9
12.1
17.4
22.5
30.5
22.8
30.6
146.4
252.9
There can be no doubt that the lag in horse breeding and sheep breeding will be remedied in a very short period.
c). Trade and transport. The progress in industry and agriculture was accompanied by an increase in the trade of the country. During the period under review the number of state and cooperative retail stores increased by 25 per cent. State and cooperative retail trade increased by 178 per cent. Trade in the collective farm markets increased by 112 per cent.
Here is the corresponding table:
Trade
a- »
g'g:>5
•a -^
oo 4J ?o +J
Ol C5 O5 QJ
1. State and cooperative
retail stores and booths
---at end of year . .
285,355
286,236
268,713
289,473
327,361
356,930
126.1
2. State and cooperative
retail 'tirade, including
public catering (lim
millions of rubles) . . .
49,789.2
61,814.7
81,712.1
106,760.9
125,943.2
138,574.3
278.3
3. Trade in collective
farm markets (in
millions of rubles)
11,500 0
14,000.0
14,500.0
15,607.2
17,799.7
24,399.2
212.2
4. Regional wholesale
departments of the
People's Commissariats of
the Food Industry,
Light Industry, Heavy
Industry, Timber
Industry, and Local
Industry of the Union
Republics---at end of
1,141
1,798
1,912
1,994
277.7
It is obvious that trade in the country could not have developed in this way without a certain increase in freight traffic. And indeed during the period under review freight traffic increased in all branches of transport, especially rail and air. There was an increase in waterborne freight, too, but with considerable fluctuations, and in 1938, it is to be regretted, there was even a drop in water-borne freight as compared with the previous year.
Here is the corresponding table:
Freight Traffic
i TO £*
5 £2 &
giO** 8
Railways (in millions
of ton-kilometres) • .
169,500
205,700
258,100
323,400
354,800
369,100
217.7
River and marine
transport (in
millions of ton--
kilometres) - ....
50,200
56,500
68,300
72,300
70,100
66,000
131.5
Civil air fleet (in
thousands of
tonkilometres) . .
3,100
6,400
9,800
21,900
24,900
31,700
1,022.6
There can be no doubt that the lag in water transport in 1938 will be remedied in 1939.
The steady progress of industry and agriculture could not but lead, and has actually led, to a new rise in the material and cultural standard of the people.
The abolition of exploitation and the consolidation of the socialist economic system, the absence of unemployment, with its attendant poverty, in town and country, the enormous expansion of industry and the steady growth in the number of workers, the increase in the productivity of labour of the workers and collective farmers, the securement of the land to the collective farms in perpetuity, and the vast number of first-class vtractors and agricultural machines supplied to the collective farms---all this has created effective conditions for a further rise in the standard of living of the workers and peasants. In its turn, the improvement in the standard of living of the workers and peasants has naturally led to an improvement in the standard of living 29 of the intelligentsia, who represent a considerable force in our country and serve ,ithe interests of the workers and the peasants.
Now it is no longer a question of finding room in industry for unemployed and homeless peasants who have been set adrift from their villages and live in fear of starvation---of giving them jobs out of charity. The time has long gone by when there were such peasants in our country. And this is a good thing, of course, for it testifies to the prosperity of our countryside. If anything, it is now a question of asking the collective farms to comply with our request and to release, say, one and a half million young collective farmers annually for the needs of our expanding industry. The collective farms, which have already become prosperous, should bear in mind that if we do not get this assistance from them it will be very difficult to continue the expansion of our industry, and that if we do not expand our industry we will not be able to satisfy the peasants' growing demand for consumers' goods. The collective farms are quite able to meet this request of ours, since the abundance of machinery in the collective farms releases a portion of the rural workers, who, if transferred to industry, could be of immense service to our whole national economy.
As a result, we have the following indications of the improvement in the standard of living^^1^^ of the workers and peasants during the period under review:
1. The national income rose from 48,500,000,000 rubles in 1933 to 105,000,000,000 rubles in 1938;
2. The number of workers and other employees rose from a little over 22,000,000 in 1933 to 28,000,000 in 1938;
3. The total annual payroll of workers and other employees rose from 34,953,000,000 rubles to 96,425,000,000 rubles;
4. The ,average annual wages of industrial workers, which amounted to 1,513 rubles in 1933, rose to 3,447 rubles in 1938;
5. The total monetary incomes of the .collective farms rose from 5,661,900,000 rubles in 1933 to 14,180,100,000 rubles in 1937;
6. The average amount of grain received per collective farm household in the grain-growing regions rose from 61 poods in 1933 to 144 poods in 1937, exclusive of seed, emergency seed stocks, fodder for the collectively-owned cattle, grain deliveries, and payments in kind for work performed by the machine and tractor stations;
7. State budget appropriations for social and cultural services rose from 5,839,900,000 rubles in 1933 to 35,202,500,000 rubles in 1938.
As regards the cultural standard of the people, its rise was commensurate with the rise in the standard of living.
30From the standpoint of the cultural development of the people, the period under review has been marked by a veritable cultural revolution. The introduction of universal compulsory elementary education in the languages of the various nations of the U.S.S.R., an increasing number of schools and scholars of all grades, an increasing number of college-trained experts, and the creation ,and growth of a new intelligentsia, a Soviet intelligentsia---such is the general picture of the cultural advancement of our people.
Here are the figures:
1) Rise in the Cultural Level of the People
Unit of
measurement
1933-34
1938-39
1938-39
compared
with
1933-34
Number of pupils and students of all
grades ........ • . . .
thousands
23,814
33,965.4
142.6%
Of which:
17,873.5
21,288.4
119. 1^^0^^/
Secondary (general and special) . .
••
5,482.2
458.3
12,076.0
601.0
220.3%
131.1%
Number of persons engaged in all
forms of study in the U.S.S.R. . .
Number of public libraries ....
Number of books in public libraries
Number of clubs ........
millions
thousands
40.3
86.0
61.1
47,442.1
70.0
126.6
95.6
173.7%
147.2%
156.b°/
units
687 790134.6%
Number of cinema installations (ex-
27,467
30,461
110.9%
Of which:
49815,202
31 times ~
Number of cinema installations ( excluding narrow-film) in rural areas ~
Of which:
••
17,470
-24
18,991
6,670
108.7%
278 times ~
Annual newspaper circulation . . .
millions
4,984.6
7,092.4
142.3%
2) Number of Schools Built in the 'U.S.S.R. in 1933-38
In towns and
hamlets
In rural
localities ~
Total
1933 .
'326
3,261
3,587
1934 .......
3,488
4,065
1935 ........
2,829
3,362
1,505
4,206
6,711
1937 . .....
730
1,323
•2,053
1938 ........
683
1,246
1,829
Total (1933-38). . .
4,254
16,353
20,607
3) Young Specialists Graduated from Higher Educational Institutions in 1933-38
(In thousands)
1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 Total for U.S.S.R. (exclusive of
inil34.6
49.2
83.7
97.6
104.8
106.7
1. Engineers for industry and building
2. Engineers for transport and
com6.1
1.8
14.9
4.0
29.6
7.6
29.2
6.6
27.6
7.0
25.2
6.1
3. Agricultural engineers,
agronomists, veterinarians and zoo--
technicians ....
4 Economists and jurists .....
4.8
2.5
6.3
2.5
8.8
5.0
10.4
6.4
11.3
5.0
10.6
5.7
5. Teachers of secondary schools,
workers' faculties, technical schools,
•and other educational workers,
including art workers
10.5
7.9
12.5
21.6
31.7
35.7
6. Physicians, pharmacists, and
physical culture instructors .....
4.6
2.5
7.5
9.2
12.3
13.6
4.3
11.1
12.7
14.2
9.9
9.8
As a result of this immense cultural work a numerous new, Soviet intelligentsia has arisen in our country, an intelligentsia which has emerged from the ranks of the working class, peasantry and Soviet employees, which is of the flesh and blood of our people, which has never known the yoke of exploitation, which hates exploiters, and which is ready to serve the peoples of the U.S.S.R. faithfully and devotedly.
I think that the rise of this new, socialist intelligentsia of the people is one of the most important results of the cultural revolution in our country.
One of the most important results of the period under review is that it has led to the further internal consolidation of the country, to the further consolidation of the Soviet system.
Nor could it be otherwise. The firm establishment of the socialist: system in all branches of national economy, the progress of industry and agriculture, the rising material standard of the people, the rising cultural standard of the people and their increasing political activity--- all this, accomplished under the guidance of the Soviet power, could not but lead to the further consolidation of the Soviet system.
32The feature that distinguishes Soviet society today from, any capitalist society is that it no longer contains antagonistic, hostile classes; that the exploiting classes have been eliminated, while the workers, peasants and intellectuals, who make up Soviet society, live and work in friendly collaboration. While capitalist society is torn by irreconcilable contradictions between workers and capitalists and between peasants and landlords---resulting in its internal instability---iSoviet society, liberated from the yoke of exploitation, knows no such contradictions, is free of class conflicts, and presents a picture of friendly collaboration between workers, peasants and intellectuals. It is this community of interest which has formed the basis for the development of such motive forces as the moral and political unity of Soviet society, the mutual friendship of the nations of the U.S.S.R., and Soviet patriotism. It has also been the basis for the Constitution of the U.S.S.R. adopted in November 1936, and for the complete democratization of the elections to the supreme organs of the country.
As to the elections themselves, they were a magnificent demonstration of that unity of Soviet society and of that amity among the nations of the U.S.S.R. which constitute the characteristic feature of the internal situation of our country. As we know, in the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. in December 1937, nearly ninety million votes, or 98.6 per cent of the total vote, were cast for the Communist and non-Party bloc, while in the elections to the Supreme Soviets of the Union Republics in June 1938, ninety*two million votes, or 99.4 per cent of the total vote, were cast for the Communist and non-Party bloc.
There you have the basis of the stability of the Soviet system and the source of the inexhaustible strength of the Soviet power.
This means, incidentally, that in case of war, the rear and front of our army, by reason of their homogeneity and inherent unity, will be stronger than those of any other country, a fact which people beyond our borders who love military conflicts would do well to remember.
Certain foreign pressmen have been talking drivel to the effect that the purging of the Soviet organizations of spies, assassins and wreckers like Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Yakir, Tukhachevsky, Rosengoltz, Bukharin and other fiends has ``shaken'' the Soviet system and caused its "demoralization." One can only laugh at such cheap drivel. How can the purging of Soviet organizations of noxious and hostile elements shake and demoralize the Soviet system? This Trotsky-- __PRINTERS_P_33_COMMENT__ 3---263 33 Bukharin bunch of spies, murderers and wreckers, who kow-towed to the foreign world, who were possessed by a slavish instinct to grovel before every foreign bigwig, and who were ready to enter his employ as a spy---this handful of people who did not understand that the humblest Soviet citizen, being free from the fetters of capital, stands head and shoulders above any high-placed foreign bigwig, whose neck wears the yoke of capitalist slavery----who needs this miserable band of venal slaves, of what value can they be to the people, and whom can they ``demoralize''? In 1937 Tukhachevsky, Yakir, Uborevich and other fiends were sentenced to be shot. After that, the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. were held. In these elections, 98.6 per cent of the total vote was cast for the Soviet power. At the beginning of 1938 Rosengoltz, Rykov, Bukharin and other fiends were sentenced to be shot. After that, the elections to the Supreme Soviets of the Union Republics were held. In these elections 99.4 per cent of the total vote was cast for the Soviet power. Where are the symptoms of "demoralization," we would like to know, and why was this `` demoralization'' not reflected in the results of the elections?
To listen to these foreign drivellers one would think that if the spies, murderers and wreckers had been left at liberty. to wreck, murder and spy without let or hindrance, the Soviet organizations would have been far sounder and stronger. (Laughter.) Are not these gentlemen giving themselves away too soon by so insolently defending the cause of spies, murderers and wreckers?
Would it not be truer to say that the weeding out of spies, murderers and wreckers from, our Soviet organizations was bound to lead, and did lead, to the further strengthening of these organizations?
What, for instance, do the events at Lake Hassan show, if not that the weeding out of spies and wreckers is the surest means of strengthening our Soviet organizations?
__*_*_*__The tasks of the Party in the sphere of internal policy are:
1. To increase the progress of our industry, the rise of productivity of labour, and the perfection of the technique of production, in order, having already outstripped the principal capitalist countries in technique of production and rate of industrial development, to outstrip them economically as well in the next ten or fifteen years.
2. To increase the progress of our agriculture and stock breeding so as to achieve in the next three or four years an annual grain harvest of eight billion poods, with an average yield of 12-13 centners per 34 hectare; an average increase in the harvest of industrial crops of 30-35 per cent; and an increase in the number of sheep and hogs by 100 per cent, of cattle by about 40 per cent, and of horses by about 35 per cent.
3. To continue to improve the material and cultural standards qf the workers, peasants and intellectuals.
4. Steadfastly to carry into effect our Socialist Constitution; to complete the democratization of the political life of the country; to strengthen the moral and political unity of Soviet society and fraternal collaboration among our workers, peasants and intellectuals; to promote the friendship of the peoples of the U.S.S.R. to the utmost, and to develop and cultivate Soviet patriotism.
5. Never to forget 'that we are surrounded by a capitalist world; to remember that the foreign espionage services will smuggle spies, murderers and wreckers into our country; and, remembering this, to strengthen our socialist intelligence service and systematically help it to defeat and eradicate the enemies of the people.
[35] __NUMERIC_LVL2__ III __ALPHA_LVL2__ FURTHER STRENGTHENING OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.) __ALPHA_LVL3__ [introduction.]From the standpoint of the political line and day-to-day practical work, the period under review was one of complete victory for the general-line of our Party. (Loud and prolonged applause.)
The principal achievements demonstrating the correctness of the policy of our Party and the correctness of its leadership are the firm establishment of the socialist system in the entire national economy, the completion of the reconstruction of industry and agriculture on •the basis of a new technique, the fulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan in industry ahead of time, the increase of the annual grain harvest to a level of seven billion poods, the abolition of poverty and unemployment, and the raising of the material and cultural standard of the people.
In the face of these imposing achievements, the opponents of the general line of our Party, all the various ``Left'' and ``Right'' trends, all the Trotsky-Pyatakov and Bukharin-Rykov degenerates were forced to creep into their shells, to tuck away their hackneyed " platforms," and to retreat into hiding. Lacking the manhood to submit to the will of the people, 'they preferred to merge with the Mensheviks, Socialist-Revolutionaries and fascists, to become the tools of foreign espionage services, to hire themselves out as spies, and to obligate themselves to help the enemies of the Soviet Union to dismember our country and to restore capitalist slavery in it.
Such was the inglorious end of the opponents of the line of our Party, who finished up as enemies of the people.
When it had smashed the enemies of the people and purged the Party and Soviet organizations of degenerates, the Party became still more united in its political and organizational work and rallied even nitre solidly around its Central Committee. (Stormy applause.
36All the delegates rise and cheer the speaker. Shouts of "Hurrah for Comrade Stalin!" "Long live Comrade Stalin!" "Hurrah for the Central Committee of our Party!")
Let us examine the concrete facts illustrating the development of the internal life of the Party and its organizational and propaganda work during the period under review.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ 1. Measures to Improve the Composition of the Party.The strengthening of the Party and of its leading bodies during the period under review proceeded chiefly along two lines: along the line of regulating the composition of the Party, ejecting unreliable elements and selecting the best elements, and along the line of dividing up the organizations, reducing their size, and bringing the leading bodies closer to the concrete, day-to-day work of the lower bodies.
There were 1,874,488 Party members represented at the Seventeenth Party Congress. Comparing this figure with the number of Party members represented at the preceding congress, the Sixteenth Party Congress, we find that in the interval between these two congresses 600,000 new members joined the Party. The Party could not but feel that in the conditions prevailing in 1930-33 such a mass influx into its ranks was an unhealthy and undesirable expansion of its membership. The Party knew that its ranks were being joined not only by honest and loyal people, but also by chance elements and careerists, who were seeking to utilize the badge of the Party for their own personal ends. The Party could not but know that its strength lay not only in the size of its membership, but, and above all, in the quality of its members. This raised the question of regulating the composition of the Party. It was decided to continue the. purge of Party members and candidate members begun in 1933; and the purge actually was continued until May 1935. It was further decided to suspend the admission of new members into the Party; and the admission of new members actually was suspended until September 1936, the admission of new members being resumed only on November 1, 1936. Further, in connection with the dastardly murder of Comrade Kirov, which showed that there were quite a number of suspicious elements in the Party, it was decided to undertake a verification of 37 the records of Party members and an exchange of old Party cards for new ones, both these measures being completed only in September 1936. Only after this was the admission of new members and candidate members into the Party resumed. As a result of all these measures, the Party succeeded in weeding out chance, passive, careerist and directly hostile elements, and in selecting the most staunch and loyal elements. It cannot be said that the purge was not accompanied by grave mistakes. There were unfortunately more mistakes than might have been expected. Undoubtedly, we shall have no further, need of resorting to the method of mass purges. Nevertheless, the purge of 1933-36 was unavoidable and its results, on the whole, were beneficial. The number of Party members represented at this, the Eighteenth Congress is about 1,600,000, which is 270,000 less than were represented at the Seventeenth Congress. But there is nothing bad in that. On the contrary, it is all to the good, for the Party strengthens itself by clearing its ranks of dross. Our Party is now somewhat smaller in membership, but on the other hand it is better in quality.
That is a big achievement.
As regards the improvement of the day-to-day leadership of the Party by bringing it closer to the work of the lower bodies and by making it more concrete, the Party came to the conclusion that the best way to make it easier for the Party bodies to guide the organizations and to make the leadership itself concrete, alive and practical was to divide up the organizations, to reduce their size. This measure was adopted with regard both to the People's Commissariats and the administrative organizations of the various territorial divisions, that is, the Union Republics, territories, regions, districts, etc. The result of the measures adopted is that instead of 7 Union Republics, we now have 11; instead of 14 People's Commissariats of the U.S.S.R. we now have 34; instead of 70 territories and regions we now have 110; instead of 2,559 urban and rural districts we now have 3,815. Correspondingly, within the system of leading Party bodies, we now have 11 central committees, headed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.), 6 territorial committees, 104 regional committees, 30 area committees, 212 city committees, 336 city district committees, 3,479 rural district committees, and 113,060 primary Party organizations.
It cannot be said that the division of organizations is already over. Most likely it will be carried further. But, however that may be, it is already yielding good results both in the improvement of the 38 day-to-day leadership of the work and in bringing the leadership itself closer to the concrete work of the lower bodies. I need not mention that the division of organizations has made it possible to promote hundreds and thousands of new people to leading posts. That, too, is a big achievement.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ 2. Selection, Promotion and Allocation of CadresThe regulation of the composition of the Party and the bringing of the leading bodies closer to the concrete work of the lower bodies was not, and could not be, the only means of further, strengthening the Party and its leadership. Another means adopted in the period under review was a radical improvement in the training of cadres, an improvement in the work of selecting, promoting and allocating cadres and of testing them in the process of work.
The Party cadres constitute the commanding staff of the Party; and since our Party is in power, they also constitute the commanding staff of the leading organs of state. After a correct political line has been worked out and tested in practice, the Party cadres become the decisive force in the work of guiding the Party and the state. A correct political line is, of course, the primary and most important thing. But that in itself is not enough. A correct political line is not needed as a declaration, but as something to be carried into effect. But in order to carry a correct political line into effect, we must have cadres, people who understand the political line of the Party, who accept it as their own line, who are prepared to carry it into effect, who are able to put it into practice and are capable of answering for it, defending it and fighting for it. Failing this, a correct political line runs the risk of being purely nominal.
And here arises the question of the correct selection of cadres, the training of cadres, the promotion of new people, the correct allocation of cadres, and the testing of cadres by work accomplished.
What is meant by the correct selection of cadres?
The correct selection of cadres does not mean just gathering around one a lot of assistants and subs, setting up an office and issuing order after order. (Laughter.) Nor does it mean abusing one's powers, switching scores and hundreds of people back and forth from one job to another without rhyme or reason and conducting endless "reorganizations." (Laughter.)
The proper selection of cadres means:
39Firstly, valuing cadres as the gold reserve of the Party and the state, treasuring them, respecting them.
Secondly, knowing cadres, carefully studying their individual merits and shortcomings, knowing in what post the capacities of a given worker are most likely to develop.
Thirdly, carefully fostering cadres, helping every promising worker to advance, not grudging time on patiently ``bothering'' with such workers and accelerating their development.
Fourthly, boldly promoting new and young cadres in time, so as not to allow them to stagnate in their old posts and grow stale.
Fifthly, allocating workers to posts in such a way that each feels he is in the right place, that each may contribute to our common cause the maximum his personal capacities enable him to contribute, and that the general trend of the work of allocating cadres may fully answer to the demands of the political line for the carrying out of which this allocation of cadres is designed.
Particularly important in this respect is the bold and timely promotion of new and young cadres. It seems to me that our people are not quite clear on this point yet. Some think that in selecting people we must chiefly rely on the old cadres. Others, on the contrary, think that we must chiefly rely on young cadres. It seems to me that both are mistaken. The old cadres, of course, represent a valuable asset to the Party and the state. They possess what the young cadres lack, namely, tremendous experience in leadership, a schooling in Marxist-Leninist principles, knowledge of affairs, and a capacity for orientation. But, firstly, there are never enough old cadres, there are far less than required, and they are already partly going out of commission owing to the operation of the laws of nature. Secondly, part of the old cadres are sometimes inclined to keep a too persistent eye on the past, to cling to the past, to stay in the old rut and fail to observe the new in life. This is called losing the sense of the new. It is a very serious and dangerous shortcoming. As to the young cadres, they, of course, have not the experience, the schooling, the knowledge of affairs and the capacity of orientation of the old cadres. But, firstly, the young cadres constitute the vast majority; secondly, they are young, and as yet are not subject to the danger of going out of commission; thirdly, they possess in abundance the sense of the new, which is a valuable quality in every Bolshevik worker; and, fourthly, they develop and acquire knowledge so rapidly, they press upward so eagerly, that the time is not far off when they will overtake the old fellows, take their stand side by side with them, and become 40 a worthy replacement for them. Consequently, the thing is not whether to rely on the old cadres or on the new cadres, but to steer for a combination, a union of the old and the young cadres in one common symphony of leadership of the Party and the state. ( Prolonged applause.)
That is why we must boldly and in good time promote young cadres to leading posts.
One of the important achievements of the Party during the period under review in the matter of strengthening the Party leadership is that, when selecting cadres, it has successfully pursued, from top to bottom, just this course of combining old and young workers.
Data in the possession of the Central Committee of the Party show that during the period under review the Party succeeded in promoting to leading state and Party poSts over five hundred thousand young Bolsheviks, members of the Party and people standing close to the Party, over twenty per cent of whom were women.
What is our task now?
Our task now is to concentrate the work of selecting cadres, from top to bottom, in the hands of one body and to raise it to a proper, scientific, Bolshevik level.
This entails putting an end to the division of the work of studying, promoting and selecting cadres among various departments and sectors, and concentrating it in one body.
This body should be the Cadres Administration of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and a corresponding cadres department in each of the republican, territorial and regional Party organizations.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ 3. Party Propaganda. Marxist-Leninist Training ofThere is still another sphere of Party work, a very important and very responsible sphere, in which the work of strengthening the Party and its leading bodies has been carried on during the period under review. I am referring to Party propaganda and agitation, oral and printed, the work of training the Party members and the Party cadres in the spirit of Marxism-Leninism, the work of raising the political and theoretical level of the Party and its workers.
There is hardly need to dwell on the cardinal importance of Party propaganda, of the Marxist-Leninist training of our people. I am 41 referring not only to Party functionaries. I am also referring to the workers in the Young Communist League, trade union, trade, cooperative, economic, state, educational, military and other organizations. , The work of regulating the composition of the Party and of bringing the leading bodies closer to the activities of the lower bodies may be organized satisfactorily; the work of promoting, selecting and allocating cadres may be organized satisfactorily; but, with all this, if our Party propaganda for some reason or other goes lame, if the MarxistLeninist training of our cadres begins to languish, if our work of raising the political and theoretical level of these cadres flags, and the cadres themselves cease on account of this to show interest in the prospect of our further progress, cease to understand the truth of our cause and are transformed into narrow plodders with no outlook, blindly and mechanically carrying out instructions from above---then our entire state and Party work must inevitably languish. It must be accepted as an axiom that the higher the political level and the Marxist-Leninist knowledge of the workers in any branch of state or Party work, the better and more fruitful will be the work itself, and the more effective the results of the work; and, vice versa, the lower the political level of the workers, and the less they are imbued with the knowledge of Marxism-Leninism, the greater will be the likelihood of disruption and failure in the work, of the workers themselves becoming shallow and deteriorating into paltry plodders, of their degenerating altogether. It may be confidently stated that if we succeeded in training the cadres in all branches of our work ideologically, and in schooling them politically, to such an extent as to enable them easily to orientate themselves in the internal and international situation; if we succeeded in making them quite mature Marxists-Leninists capable of solving the problems involved in the guidance of the country without serious error, we would have every reas'on to consider ninetenths of our problems already settled. And we certainly can accomplish this, for we have all the means and opportunities for doing so. The training and moulding of our young cadres usually proceeds in some particular branch of science or technology, along the line of specialization. This is necessary and desirable. There is no reason why a man who specializes in medicine should at the same time specialize in physics or botany, or vice versa. But there is one branch df science which Bolsheviks in all branches of science are in duty bound to know, and that is the Marxist-Leninist science of society, of the laws of social development, of the laws of development of the proletarian revolution, of the laws of development of socialist 42 construction, and of the victory of communism. For a man who calls himself a Leninist cannot be considered a real Leninist if he shuts himself up in his speciality, in mathematics, botany or chemistry, let us say, and sees nothing beyond that speciality. A Leninist cannot be just a specialist in his favourite science; he must also be a political and social worker, keenly interested in the destinies of his country, acquainted with the laws of social development, capable of applying these laws, and striving to be an active participant in the political guidance of the country. This, of course, will be an additional burden on specialists who are Bolsheviks. But it will be a burden more than compensated for by its results.
The task of Party propaganda, the task of the Marxist-Leninist training of cadres, is to help our cadres in all branches of work to become versed in the Marxist-Leninist science of the laws of social development.
Measures for improving the work of propaganda and of the Marxist-Leninist training of cadres have been discussed many times by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) jointly with propagandists from various regional Party organizations. The publication, in September 1938, of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)---Short Course was taken into account in this connection. It was ascertained that the publication of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.) had given a new impetus to Marxist-Leninist propaganda in our country. The results of the work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) have been published in its decision, "On the Organization of Party Propaganda in Connection with the Publication of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)---- Short Course."
On the basis of this decision and with due reference to the decisions of the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) of March 1937, "On Defects in Party Work," the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) has outlined the following major measures for eliminating the defects in Party propaganda and improving the work of Marxist-Leninist training of Party members and Party cadres:
1. To concentrate the work of Party propaganda and agitation in one body and to merge the propaganda and agitation departments and the press departments into a single Propaganda and Agitation Administration of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.), and to organize corresponding propaganda and agitation departments in each republican, territorial and regional Party organization;
2. Recognizing as incorrect the infatuation for the system of propaganda through study circles, and considering the method of 43 individual study of the principles of Marxism-Leninism by Party members to be more expedient, to centre the attention of the Party on propaganda through the press and on the organization of a system of propaganda by lectures;
3. To organize one-year Courses of Instruction for our lower cadres in each regional centre;
4. To organize two-year Lenin Schools for our middle cadres in various centres of the country;
5. To organize a Higher School of Marxism-Leninism under the auspices of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) with a threeyear course for the training of highly qualified Party theoreticians;
6. To set up one-year Courses of Instruction for propagandists and journalists in various parts of the country;
7. To set up in connection with the Higher School of MarxismLeninism six-month Courses of Instruction for teachers of MarxismLeninism in the higher educational establishments.
There can be no doubt that the realization of these measures, which are already being carried out, although not yet sufficiently, will soon yield beneficial results.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ 4. Some Questions of TheoryAnother of the defects of our propagandist and ideological work is the absence of full clarity among our comrades on certain theoretical questions of vital practical importance, the existence of a certain amount of confusion on these questions. I refer to the question of the state in general, and of our socialist state in particular, and to the question of our Soviet intelligentsia.
It is sometimes asked: "We have abolished the exploiting classes; there are no longer any hostile classes in the country; there is nobody to suppress; hence there is no more need for the state; it must die away.---Why then do we not help our socialist state to die away? Why do we not strive to put an end to it? Is it not time to throw out all this rubbish of a state?''
Or further: "The exploiting classes have already been abolished in our country; socialism has been built in the main; we are advancing towards communism. Now, the Marxist doctrine of the state says that there is to be no state under communism.---Why then do We not help our socialist state to die away? Is it not time we relegated the state to the museum of antiquities?''
44These questions show that those who ask them have conscientiously memorized certain propositions contained in the doctrine of Marx and Engels about the state. But they also show that these comrades have failed to understand the essential meaning of this doctrine; that they have failed to realize in what historical conditions the various propositions of this doctrine were elaborated; and, what is more, that they do not understand present-day international conditions, have overlooked the capitalist encirclement and the dangers it entails for the socialist country. These questions not only betray an underestimation of the capitalist encirclement, but also an underestimation of the role and significance of the bourgeois states and their organs, which send spies, assassins and wreckers into our country and are waiting for a favourable opportunity to attack it by armed force. They likewise betray an underestimation of the role and significance of our socialist state and of its military, punitive and intelligence organs, which are essential for the defence of the socialist land from foreign attack. It must be confessed that the comrades mentioned are not the only ones to sin in this underestimation. All the Bolsheviks, all of us without exception, sin to a certain extent in this respect. Is it not surprising that we learnt about the espionage and conspiratorial activities of the Trotskyite and Bukharinite leaders only quite recently, in 1937 and 1938, although, as the evidence shows, these gentry were in the service of foreign espionage organizations and carried on conspiratorial activities from the very first days of the October Revolution? How could we have failed to notice so grave a matter? How are we to explain this blunder? The usual answer to this question is that we could not possibly have assumed that these people could have fallen so low. But that is no explanation, still less is it a justification; for the blunder was a blunder. How is this blunder to be explained? It is to be explained by an underestimation of the strength and consequence of the mechanism of-the bourgeois states surrounding us and of their espionage organs, which endeavour to take advantage of people's weaknesses, their vanity, their slackness of will, to enmesh them in their espionage nets and use them to surround the organs of the Soviet state. It is to be explained by an underestimation of the role and significance of the mechanism of our socialist state and of its intelligence service, by an underestimation of this intelligence service, by the twaddle that an intelligence service in a Soviet state is an unimportant trifle, and that the Soviet intelligence service and the Soviet state itself will soon have to be relegated to the museum of antiquities.
45What could have given rise to this underestimation?
It arose owing to the fact that certain of the general propositions in the Marxist doctrine of the state were incompletely worked out and inadequate. It received currency owing to our unpardonably heedless attitude to matters pertaining to the theory of the state, in spite of the fact that we have twenty years of practical experience in matters of state which provide rich material for theoretical generalizations, and in spite of the fact that, given the desire, we have every opportunity of successfully filling this gap in theory. We have forgotten Lenin's highly important injunction about the theoretical duties of Russian Marxists, that it is their mission to further develop the Marxist theory. This is what Lenin said in this connection:
``We do not regard Marxist theory as something completed and inviolable; on the contrary, we are convinced that it has only laid the corner-stone of the science which socialists must further advance in all directions if they wish to keep pace with life. We think that an independent elaboration of the Marxist theory is especially essential for Russian socialists, for this theory provides only general guiding principles, which, in particular, are applied in England differently from France, in France differently from Germany, and in Germany differently from Russia." (Lenin, Collected Works, Russ. ed., Vol. II, p. 492.)
Consider, for example, the classical formulation of the theory of the development of the socialist state given by Engels:
46``As soon as there is no longer any class of society to be held in subjection; as soon as, along with class domination and the struggle for individual existence based on the former anarchy of production, the collisions and excesses arising from these have also been abolished, there is nothing more to be repressed which would make a special repressive force, a state, necessary. The first act in which the state really comes forward as the representative of society as a whole---the taking possession of the means of production in the name of society---is at the same time its last independent act as a state. The interference of the state power in social relations becomes superfluous in one sphere after another, and then ceases of itself. The government of persons is replaced by the administration of things and the direction of the process of production. The state is not 'abolished,' it withers away." (Herr Eugen Duhring's Revolution in Science [Anti-Duhring], Eng. ed., p. 315.)
Is this proposition of Engels' correct?
Yes, it is correct, but only on one of two conditions: (1) if we study the socialist state only from the angle of the internal development of the country, abstracting ourselves in advance from the international factor, isolating, for the convenience of investigation, the country and the state from the international situation; or (2) if we assume that socialism is already victorious in all countries, or in the majority of countries, that a socialist encirclement exists instead of a capitalist encirclement, that there is no more danger of foreign attack, and that there is no more need to strengthen the army and the state.
Well, but what if socialism has been victorious only in one country, and if, in view of this, it is quite impossible to abstract oneself from international conditions---what then? Engels' formula does not furnish an answer to this question. As a matter of fact, Engels did not set himself this question, and therefore could not have given an answer to it. Engels proceeds from the assumption that socialism has already been victorious in all countries, or in a majority of countries, more or less simultaneously. Consequently, Engels is not here investigating any specific socialist state of any particular country, but the development of the socialist state in general, on the assumption that socialism has been victorious in a majority of countries---- according to the formula: "Assuming that socialism is victorious in a majority of countries, what changes must the proletarian, socialist state undergo?" Only this general and abstract character of the problem can explain why in his investigation of the question of the socialist state Engels completely abstracted himself from such a factor as international conditions, the international situation.
But it follows from this that Engels' general formula about the destiny of the socialist state in general cannot be extended to the partial and specific case of the victory of socialism in one country only, a country which is surrounded by a capitalist world, is subject to the menace of foreign military attack, cannot therefore abstract itself from the international situation, and must have at its disposal a welltrained army, well-organized punitive organs, and a strong intelligence service---consequently, must have its own state, strong enough to defend the conquests of socialism from foreign attack.
We have no right to expect of the classical Marxist writers, separated as they were from our day by a period of forty-five or fifty-five years, that they should have foreseen each and every zigzag of history in the distant future in every separate country. It would be ridiculous to expect that the classical Marxist writers should have elaborated 47 for our benefit ready-made solutions for each and every theoretical problem that might arise in any particular country fifty or one hundred years afterwards, so that we, the descendants of the classical Marxist writers, might calmly doze at the fireside and munch ready^ made solutions. (General laughter.) But we can and should expect of the Marxists-Leninists of our day that they do not confine themselves to learning by rote a few general tenets of Marxism; that they delve deeply into the essence of Marxism; that they learn to take account of the experience gained in the twenty years of existence of the socialist state in our country; that, lastly, they learn, with the use of this experience and with knowledge of the essence of Marxism, to apply the various general theses of Marxism concretely, to lend them greater precision and improve them. Lenin wrote his famous book, The State and Revolution, in August 1917, that is, a few months before the October Revolution and the establishment of the Soviet state. Lenin considered it the main task of this book to defend Marx's and Engels' doctrine of the state from the distortions and vulgarizations of the opportunists. Lenin was preparing to write a second volume of The State and Revolution, in which he intended to sum up the principal lessons of the experience of the Russian revolutions of 1905 and 1917. There can be no doubt that Lenin intended in the second volume of his book to elaborate and develop the theory of the state on the basis of the experience gained during the existence of Soviet power in our country. Death, however, prevented him from carrying this task into execution. But what Lenin did not manage to do should be done by his disciples. (Loud applause.)
The state arose because society split up into antagonistic classes; it arose in order to keep in restraint the exploited majority in the interests of the exploiting minority. The instruments of state authority have been mainly concentrated in the army, the punitive organs, the espionage service, the prisons. Two basic functions characterize the activity of the state: at home (the main function), to keep in restraint the exploited majority; abroad (not the main function), to extend the territory of its class, the ruling class, at the expense of the territory of other states, or to defend the territory of its own state from attack by other states. Such was the case in slave society and under feudalism. Such is the case under capitalism.
In order to overthrow capitalism it was not only necessary to remove the bourgeoisie from power, it was not only necessary to expropriate the capitalists, but also to smash entirely the bourgeois state machine and its old army, its bureaucratic officialdom and its 48 police force, and to substitute for it a new, proletarian form of state, a new, socialist state. And that, as we know, is exactly what the Bolsheviks did. But it does not follow that the new proletarian state may not preserve certain functions of the old state, changed to suit the requirements of the proletarian state. Still less does it follow that the forms of our socialist state must remain unchanged, that all the original functions of our state must be fully preserved in future. As a matter of fact, the forms of our state are changing and will continue to change in line with the development of our country and with the changes in the international situation.
Lenin was absolutely right when he said:
``The forms of bourgeois states are extremely varied, but in essence they are all the same: in one way or another, in the final analysis, all these states are inevitably the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. The transition from capitalism to communism will certainly create a great variety and abundance of political forms, but in essence there will inevitably be only one: the dictatorship of the proletariat." (Lenin, The State and Revolution.)
Since the October Revolution, our socialist state has passed through two main phases in its development.
The first phase was the period from the October Revolution to the elimination of the exploiting classes. The principal task in that period was to suppress the resistance of the overthrown classes, to organize the defence of the country against the attack of the interventionists, to restore industry and agriculture, and to prepare the conditions for the elimination of the capitalist elements. Accordingly, in this period our state performed two main functions. The first function was to suppress the overthrown classes inside the country. In this respect our state bore a superficial resemblance to previous states whose functions had also been to suppress recalcitrants, with the fundamental difference, however, that our state suppressed the exploiting minority in the interests of the labouring majority, while previous states had suppressed the exploited majority in the interests of the exploiting minority. The second function was to defend the country from foreign attack. In this respect it likewise bore a superficial resemblance to previous states, which also undertook the armed defence of their countries, with the fundamental difference, however, that our state defended from foreign attack the gains of the labouring majority, while previous states in such cases defended the wealth and privileges of the exploiting minority. Our state had yet a third function: this __PRINTERS_P_49_COMMENT__ 4---263 49 was the work of economic organization and cultural education performed by our state bodies with the purpose of developing the infant shoots of the new, socialist economic system and re-educating the people in the spirit of socialism. But this new function did not attain to any considerable development in that period. - The second phase was the period from the elimination of the capitalist elements in town and country to the complete victory of the socialist economic system and the adoption of the new Constitution. The principal task in this period was to establish the socialist economic system all over the country and -to eliminate the last remnants of the capitalist elements, to bring about a cultural revolution, and to form a thoroughly modern army for the defence of the country. And the functions of our socialist state changed accordingly. The function of military suppression inside the country ceased, died away; for exploitation had been abolished, there were no more exploiters left, and so there was no one to suppress. In place of this function of suppression the state acquired the function of protecting socialist property from thieves and pilferers of the people's property. The function of defending the country from foreign attack fully remained; consequently, the Red Army and the Navy also fully remained, as did the punitive organs and the intelligence service, which are indispensable for the detection and punishment of the spies, assassins and wreckers sent into our country by foreign espionage services. The function of economic organization and cultural education by the state organs also remained, and was developed to the full. Now the main task of our state inside the country is the work of peaceful economic organization and cultural education. As for our army, punitive organs, and intelligence service, their edge is no longer turned to the inside of the country but to the outside, against external enemies.
As you see, we now have an entirely new, socialist state, without precedent in history and differing considerably in form and functions from the socialist state of the first phase.
But development cannot stop there. We are going ahead, towards communism. Will our state remain in the period of communism also?
Yes, it will, unless the capitalist encirclement is liquidated, and unless the danger of foreign military attack has disappeared. Naturally, of course, the forms of our state will again change in conformity with the change in the situation at home and abroad. • No, it will not remain and will atrophy if the capitalist 50 encirclement is liquidated and a socialist encirclement takes its place.
That is how the question stands with regard to the socialist state.
The second question is that of the Soviet intelligentsia.
On this question, too, as on the question of the state, there is a certain unclearness and confusion among Party members.
In spite of the fact that the position of the Party on the question of the Soviet intelligentsia is perfectly clear, there are still current in our Party views hostile to the Soviet intelligentsia and incompatible with the Party position. As you know, those who hold these false views practise a disdainful and contemptuous attitude to the Soviet intelligentsia and regard it as an alien force, even as a force hostile to the working class and the peasantry. True, during the period of Soviet development the intelligentsia has undergone a radical change both in its composition and status. It has come closer to the people and is honestly collaborating with the people, in which respect it differs fundamentally from the old, bourgeois intelligentsia. But this apparently means nothing to these comrades. They go on harping on the old tunes and wrongly apply to the Soviet intelligentsia views and attitudes which were justified in the old days when the intelligentsia was in the service of the landowners and capitalists.
In the old days, under capitalism, before the revolution, the intelligentsia consisted primarily of members of the propertied classes--- noblemen, manufacturers, merchants, kulaks and so on. Some members of the intelligentsia were sons of small tradesmen, petty officials, and even of peasants and workingmen, but they did not and could not play a decisive part. The intelligentsia as a whole depended for their livelihood on the propertied classes and ministered to the propertied classes. Hence it is easy to understand the mistrust, often bordering on hatred, with which the revolutionary elements of our country and above all the workers regarded the intellectuals. True, the old intelligentsia produced some courageous individuals, handfuls of revolutionary people-who adopted the standpoint of the working class and completely threw in their lot with the working class. But such people were all too few among the intelligentsia, and they could not change the complexion of the intelligentsia as a whole.
Matters with regard to the intelligentsia have undergone a fundamental change, however, since the October Revolution, since the defeat of the foreign armed intervention, and especially since the victory of industrialization and collectivization, when the abolition of exploitation and the firm establishment of the socialist economic __PRINTERS_P_51_COMMENT__ 4* 51 system made it really possible to give the country a new constitution and to put it into effect. The most influential and qualified section of the old intelligentsia broke away from the main body in the very first days of the October Revolution, proclaimed war on the Soviet government, and joined the ranks of the saboteurs. They met with well-deserved punishment for this; they were smashed and dispersed by the organs of Soviet power. Subsequently the majority of those that survived were recruited by the enemies of our country as wreckers and spies, and thus were expunged by their own deeds from the ranks of the intellectuals. Another section of the old intelligentsia, less qualified but more numerous, long continued to mark time, waiting for "better days"; but then, apparently giving up hope, decided to go and serve and to live in harmony with the Soviet government. The greater part of this group of the old intelligentsia are well on in years and are beginning to go out of commission. A third section of the old intelligentsia, mainly comprising its rank-and-file, and still less qualified than the section just mentioned, joined forces with the people and supported the Soviet government. It needed to perfect its education, and it set about doing so in our universities. But parallel with this painful process of differentiation and break-up of the old intelligentsia there went on a rapid process of formation, mobilization and mustering of forces of a new intelligentsia. Hundreds of thousands of young people coming from the ranks of the working class, the peasantry and the working intelligentsia entered the universities and technical colleges, from which they emerged to reinforce the attenuated ranks of the intelligentsia. They infused fresh blood into it and reanimated it in a Soviet spirit. They radically changed the whole aspect of the intelligentsia, moulding it in their own form and image. The remnants of the old intelligentsia were dissolved in the new, Soviet intelligentsia, the intelligentsia of the people. There thus arose a new, Soviet intelligentsia, intimately bound up with the people and, for the most part, ready to serve them faithfully and loyally.
As a result, we now have a numerous, new, popular, socialist intelligentsia, fundamentally different from the old, bourgeois intelligentsia both in composition and in social and pqlitical character.
The old theory about the intelligentsia, which taught that it should be treated with distrust and combated, fully applied to the old, prerevolutionary intelligentsia, which served the landlords and capitalists. This theory is now out-of-date and does not fit our new, Soviet intelligentsia. Our new intelligentsia demands a new theory, a theory 52 teaching the necessity for a cordial attitude towards it, solicitude and respect for it, and cooperation with it in the interests of the working class and the peasantry.
That is clear, I should think.
It is therefore all the more astonishing and strange that after all these fundamental changes in the status of the intelligentsia people should be found within our Party who attempt to apply the old theory, which was directed against the bourgeois intelligentsia, to our new, Soviet intelligentsia, which is basically a socialist intelligentsia. These people, it appears, assert that workers and peasants who until recently were working in" Stakhanov fashion in the factories and collective farms and who were then sent to the universities to be educated, thereby ceased to be real people and became second-rate people. So we are to conclude that education is a pernicious and dangerous thing. (Laughter.) We want all our workers and peasants to be cultured and educated, and we shall achieve this in time. But in the opinion of these queer comrades, this purpose harbours a grave danger; for after the workers and. peasants become cultured and educated they may face the danger of being classified as second-rate people. (Loud laughter.) The possibility is not precluded that these queer comrades may in time sink to the position of extolling backwardness, ignorance, benightedness and obscurantism. It would be quite in the nature of things. Theoretical vagaries have never led, and never can lead, to any good.
Such is the position with regard to our new, socialist intelligentsia.
__*_*_*__Our tasks in respect to the further strengthening of the Party are:
1. To systematically improve the composition of the Party, raising the level of knowledge of its membership, and admitting into its ranks, by a process of individual selection, only tried and tested comrades who are loyal to the cause <ff communism.
2. To establish closer contact between the leading bodies and the work of the lower bodies, so as to make their work of leadership more practical and specific and less confined to meetings and offices.
3. To centralize the work of selecting cadres, to train them carefully and foster them, to study the merits and demerits of workers thoroughly, to promote young workers boldly and adapt the selection and allocation of cadres to the requirements of the political line of the Party.
534. To centralize Party propaganda and agitation, to extend the propaganda of the ideas of Marxism-Leninism, and to raise the theoretical level and improve the political schooling of our cadres.
__*_*_*__Comrades, I am now about to conclude my report.
I have sketched in broad outline the path traversed by our Party during the period under review. The results of the work of the Party and of its Central Committee during this period are well known. There have been mistakes and shortcomings in our work. The Party and the Central Committee did not conceal them and strove to correct them. There have also been important successes and big achievements, which must not be allowed to turn our heads.
The chief conclusion to be drawn is that the working class of our country, having abolished the exploitation of man by man "and firmly established the socialist system, has proved to the world the truth of its cause. That is the chief conclusion, for it strengthens our faith in the power of the working class and in the inevitability of its ultimate victory.
The bourgeoisie of all countries asserts that the people cannot get along without capitalists and landlords, without merchants and kulaks. The working class of our country has proved in practice that the people can get along without exploiters perfectly well.
The bourgeoisie of all countries asserts that, having destroyed the old bourgeois system, the working class is incapable of building anything new to replace the old. The working class of our country has proved in practice that it is quite capable not only of destroying the old system but of building a new and better system, a socialist system, a system,, moreover, to which crises and unemployment are unknown.
The bourgeoisie of all countries asserts that the peasantry is incapable of taking the path of Socialism. The collective farm peasants of our country have proved in practice that they can do so quite successfully.
The chief endeavour of the bourgeoisie of all countries and of its reformist hangers-on is to kill in the working class faith in its own strength, faith in the possibility and inevitability of its victory, and thus to perpetuate capitalist slavery. For the bourgeoisie knows that if capitalism has not yet been overthrown and still continues to exist, it has not itself to "thank, but the fact that the proletariat has still not faith enough in the possibility of its victory. It 54 cannot be said that the efforts of the bourgeoisie in this respect have been altogether unsuccessful. It must be confessed that the bourgeoisie and its agents among the working class have to some extent succeeded in poisoning the minds of the working class with the venom of doubt and scepticism. If the successes of the working class of our country, if its fight and victory serve to rouse the spirit of the working class in the capitalist countries and to strengthen its faith in its own power and in its victory, then our Party may say that its work has not been in vain. And there need be no doubt that this will be the case. (Loud and prolonged applause.) .Long live our victorious working class! (Applause.) Long live our victorious collective farm peasantry! (Applause.) Long live our socialist intelligentsia! (Applause.) Long live the great friendship of the nations of our country! (Applause.)
Long live the Communist Party of the Soviet Union! (Applause.) (The delegates rise and hail Comrade Stalin with loud and stormy cheers. Cries of: "Hurrah for Comrade Stalin!" "Hurrah for our great Stalin!" "Hurrah for our beloved Stalin!")
[55] ~ [56]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
D. MANUILSKY
Comrades, in the five years that separate the Eighteenth Congress of the G.P.S.U. (B.) from the Seventeenth Congress, big changes have taken place in the life of classes, peoples and states, changes which testify that all the contradictions of the capitalist system have grown more acute and that the gulf hetween the world of socialism and the world of capitalism has grown wider.
In his historic report, which was so impatiently awaited by the Party, by the working people of our country, and by all friends and foes of the U.S.S.R., Comrade Stalin has made a most valuable contribution to the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of the state; he has given a Marxist analysis, unsurpassed for its profundity, of the international situation; he has made an exhaustive summary of the socialist development of our country; and he has outlined the immense prospects which open up before the Soviet people as a result of its socialist victories. Comrade Stalin has shown how mightily the U.S.S.R. has advanced, having solved the most difficult task of the dictatorship of the proletariat, namely, the task of completely eliminating the exploiting classes and of bringing the millions of individual peasant farms within the socialist system. He has shown how the socialist economic system has steadily grown during these years, how the material and cultural standard of the working people has risen, how the fraternity of the nations inhabiting the U.S.S.R. has been cemented, how socialist democracy has blossomed forth in the Soviet country, how strong the moral and political unity of the Soviet people has grown, and how mighty has become the defensive power of the Soviet country. (Applause.)
Comrade Stalin has shown that the wise peace policy of the U.S.S.R., combined with firmness in defending the frontiers of the Soviet country and with relentlessness in crushing the TrotskyBukharin gang of spies and warmongers, is not only in the interest of the Soviet people, but also in the interest of the entire international working class and of the nations of all countries.
59Comrade Stalin's report is an historic landmark, indicating that the U.S.S.R. has entered a new phase of development, to be marked by the completion of the construction of classless society and a gradual transition from socialism to communism. And this immense victory of the U.S.S.R., which is an event of historic significance, is intensifying the process of revolutionizing the working people in the capitalist countries, and is filling the world reactionaries with fear of the country which, despite all the machinations of the surrounding capitalist world, is carrying out the Third Stalin Five-Year Plan, that new gigantic stride towards the complete triumph of communism.
Analysing the capitalist economic situation at the Seventeenth Party Congress, Comrade Stalin said that the depression which had set in after the crisis of 1929-33 would not be an ordinary one, but a depression of a "special kind." Describing the international situation, Comrade Stalin said that the growing acuteness of the imperialist contradictions had already created the ground for military conflicts, and that things were clearly moving towards a new imperialist war. This analysis has been completely confirmed.
The level of capitalist production, which reached its highest ppint, after the low-point of 1932, in the middle of 1937, dropped again in 1938 to 91 per cent of the 1929 level. In the period 1929-37 production increased by only 3.5 per cent, whereas during the economic cycle of 1921-29 the increase in production was 49.5 per cent. This shows that the depression that "set in after the crisis of 1929-33 really was a depression of a special kind and was followed neither by a general revival, nor by an industrial boom.
The condition of the working masses in the capitalist countries has grown markedly worse in the past five years. Capital is conducting a furious attack on the standard of living of the working people, particularly in the countries where there is a fascist dictatorship. Wages are sharply declining and the working day lengthening. In Germany, for example, despite the fact that the retail prices of staple foodstuffs have considerably risen, increases of wages have been strictly forbidden since the establishment of the fascist dictatorship. At the same time, the various compulsory deductions from wages made by the fascist authorities amount to 25-30 per cent. A ten-hour day has been established by law, and in the particularly important 60 branches of industry, that is, in the munitions industry generally and on fortification work, the working day is fourteen hours. In the socalled "labour service camps," hundreds of thousands of young people are working for thin gruel and 50 pfennings a day. Since the fascist dictatorship was established in Italy the standard of living of the masses has been reduced by almost half. There has been a marked decline in consumption of all staple food articles since the war in Abyssinia. In Japan the working day is as long as twelve to sixteen hours, and even the miserable wage rates of 1929 have been reduced on the average by over 16 per cent, in spite of the fact that the cost of living has risen during this period by 30 or 40 per cent.
During the past five years the number of unemployed has never dropped below fourteen million, and by the end of JL938 it amounted to eighteen million, not counting the vast army of millions of unemployed agricultural labourers, or the workers on part-time jobs, or the unemployed of countries like India and China where half the population of the capitalist world lives.
The agrarian crisis, which is again growing acute, especially in the U.S.A., Poland, Rumania, Yugoslavia and Hungary, as well as in the colonies, is leading to a still greater cleavage in the countryside and is reducing millions of peasants to pauperism. Parallel with this we observe the growing ruin of the urban lower middle class, especially in the fascist countries, where tens of thousands of small industries and businesses have been reduced to bankruptcy. In Japan, owing to the shortage of raw material, 88,305 small undertakings were closed down in 1938 alone.
The economic crisis, the increased unevenness of development of the capitalist countries, and the growing profundity of the general crisis of capitalism, have rendered all the existing contradictions among the imperialist states acute in the extreme. The struggle for foreign markets, for spheres of influence, for colonies, for a new redivision of the world has grown more acute. This struggle has become exceptionally intense in the Mediterranean and the Pacific, in Latin America, in south and southeastern Europe, and along the world's major lines of communication.
The fascist states---Germany, Italy and Japan---have assumed the offensive in the international arena. The fascist rulers hope to improve their affairs, to put an end to the internal difficulties of the fascist regime, and to avert its bankruptcy by plundering other nations. War is necessary to the fascist rulers, because they cannot fulfil their demagogic promises to the masses, who are demanding butter, not guns, 61 bread, and not dreadnoughts. For the fascist rulers war is a means of suppressing the discontent of the masses and holding the latter in subjection. They need wars in order to maintain their ``prestige'' in the eyes of their own supporters.
The fascist adventurers are in a hurry to take the offensive because they fear the growing movement of the Popular Front, the growing resistance of the nations to fascist aggression, the union and welding of the peoples into an international front of struggle against the fascist warmakers. The fascist rulers want to forestall the welding of the masses and to strike at them before they unite to repulse fascism. They are trying to divide the peoples, to sow discord among them, in order the more easily to defeat them one by one. They are making skilful use of the complaisance of the ruling classes of Britain and France, and are turning them into accomplices of their nefarious deeds, thus compromising and discrediting them still further, and endeavouring by this rascally manoeuvre to divert the indignation of the masses from themselves.
The fascist rulers are striving to take advantage of the fear of socialism and the working class entertained by the bourgeoisies of other capitalist countries in order to secure their support in the attack on their peoples. They resort to bribery, deception, blackmail and threats in furtherance of their aims of conquest. Before hurjing their armies of occupation into foreign territories, they first send an army of spies. They send them everywhere---to America, England, France and other countries. In France they maintain the Cagoulard bands, through whom they engineer a series of explosions. They are forming gangs of diversionists in Rumania for the commission of terrorist acts; they are conducting extensive disruptive activities in Poland, in preparation for her dismemberment; they are forming secret companies of armed men in the Baltic countries, in Finland, Hungary, and Slovakia, and in the Balkan countries. They stage internal " rebellions," as was the case not only in Austria and the Sudeten region, but in Mexico, Brazil and Peru.
The agents of the fascist bloc of aggressors conduct their disruptive work on a particularly wide scale in the British and French colonies. They engineer rebellion in Palestine, form a semi-military "National Volunteer Corps" in.India, set up fascist military groups in South Africa, and supply arms and money to the feudal chiefs in the Arab countries. They sow discord everywhere, so as to disintegrate and weaken their possible opponents even before the outbreak of war.
The aggressive bloc of fascist powers, which are interested more 62 than all others in a new forcible redivision of the world, are plunging the nations into a new imperialist war. In 1935 Italy invaded Abyssinia; in 1936 Germany and Italy began to intervene in Spain; in 1937 the Japanese militarists, having seized Manchuria, started a war with the aim of gaining possession of the whole of China and ousting America, England and France from that country; in March 1938 Germany occupied Austria, and in .September 1938 she dismembered Czechoslovakia.
Would this have been possible if the capitalist governments of the other big powers had not connived at the aggression of the German and Italian fascists and of the Japanese fascist militarists? Of course not. It was possible only because the bloc of fascist aggressors was assisted, and is being assisted, by the forces of world reaction, by the reactionary elements among the French and especially the British bourgeoisie. These elements cherish the idea of utilizing German fascism as a mailed fist of reaction against the U.S.S.R., as a gendarme against the international working class, the Popular Front, and the movement of the enslaved peoples for national liberation.
The plan of the British reactionary bourgeoisie is to sacrifice the small states of southeastern Europe to German fascism so as to direct Germany eastwards---against the U.S.S.R.; to attempt, by means of such a counter-revolutionary war, to retard the progress of socialism and the victory of communism in the U.S.S.R.; to buy off Germany, with her imperialist claims on British colonies. At the same time the British reactionaries would like to use the U.S.S.R. to draw the fangs of German imperialism, to weaken Germany for a long time to come, and to preserve the dominant position of British imperialism in Europe. Secondly, the British reactionaries are striving to divide up Spain and the spheres of influence in the Mediterranean with Italy at the expense of France, and to reach an agreement with Italy for the sake of imperialist ``equilibrium'' in Europe, by severing her from the bloc with Germany. Thirdly, in the Far East, the British reactionaries cherish dreams of partitioning China. They are allowing Japan to ruin and weaken China; but at the same time they are not hindering the military and economic exhaustion of Japan, so as to come forward later as an arbiter and establish a "Munich peace" in the Far East. Fourthly, the British reactionaries do not want the collapse of the fascist regime in Germany, Italy or Japan; they want to help save the governments of these countries from financial bankruptcy by granting them credits, thus making the fascist states dependent in a way on British imperialism.
63As long ago as 1927, in an article entitled "Notes on Contemporary Themes," Comrade Stalin said:
"British capitalism always was, is and will be the most vicious strangler of popular revolutions. Ever since the Great French Revolution of the end of the eighteenth century, down to the Chinese revolution that is now in progress, the British bourgeoisie has always stood in the front ranks of the butchers of the liberation movement of mankind.. . . But the British bourgeoisie does not like to fight with its own hands. It has- always preferred to wage war through others."
But the British reactionary bourgeoisie are digging their own graves with their predatory plans. By secretly supporting Japanese aggression in China, they are paving the way for the ousting of Britain from the Far East; by their concessions to Italian fascism, they are paving the way for the loss of Britain's position in the Mediterranean; by granting loans to the fascist aggressors, they are augmenting the latter's military might and the chances of their own defeat. By strengthening German fascism, they are paving the way for the partition of their own empire. By their plans of attack on the U.S.S.R., they are paving the way for the collapse not only of fascism, but of the entire capitalist system. (Applause.)
The Munich agreement was the first serious attempt to put this perfidious, but hopeless plan of the British reactionary bourgeoisie into practice. It was not peace that the reactionary conspirators of Munich brought mankind, but the prospects of a new imperialist world war. In Munich they put an end even to that anaemic European ``equilibrium'' which to some extent restrained the fascist aggressors in their plans of conquest. Under pressure of Germany and Italy, the reactionary cliques of France, tied to the apron strings of the British reactionaries, put an end with their own hands to the system of alliances which they had created after the imperialist world war of 1914-18, thereby paving the way for the transformation of France into a second-rate power.
The Munich conspirators put an end to the system of collective security and completely eliminated the League of Nations they themselves had created from the settlement of highly important questions of European and world politics. They gave a free hand to the aggressors, permitting the Italian fascists to occupy Catalonia, and the Japanese fascist militarists to seize Canton and Hainan and to create a threat to French and British possessions in the Far East.
64The Munich ``peacemakers'' have given new impetus to the armament race of the capitalist states. The Munich deal was followed by a new jump in armaments in Germany, where since the advent of the fascist dictatorship military expenditures have already increased thirty-two times, and in Italy, where during the war in Abyssinia they increased fourfold. Compared with 1936-37, military expenditures in Japan have increased more than five and a half times, in Great Britain three times, and in France over three times.
__*_*_*__However, the imperialist claims of the fascist vultures are encountering the resistance of certain capitalist states and of a large section of the ruling classes of those countries whose governments are capitulating to the fascist aggressors. The United States, the biggest capitalist power in the world, anxious to defend its interests in the LatinAmerican countries from Germany, Italy and Japan---which are straining towards and rapidly penetrating these countries---and its positions in the Philippines, China and the Pacific from Japan, is working for a bloc with the South American states to resist fascist expansion. The United States is thereby stimulating resistance to the aggressive plans of the fascists in other parts of the world, including Europe.
In Great Britain, fear for the integrity of the Empire, which is being menaced by German fascism, is impelling even a section of the imperialists, men like Duff Cooper, Eden and Churchill, into the camp of opposition to the present Conservative government. The rapacious claims of the German and Italian fascists are scaring a section of the French bourgeoisie and strengthening the position of those who are in favour of resisting them. Alarm is growing in Poland over the threat of her dismemberment by Germany. Opposition is increasing in Hungary to her enslavement by German fascism.
At the same timie there is growing indignation among the masses of Czechoslovakia and Austria, who have been enslaved by the fascist aggressors. Alarm is growing among the nations menaced by fascist aggression in the Balkans. There is a growing movement in the colonies, the peoples of which have no wish to be used as counters in the deals between the imperialist plunderers. Elements of a national front are ripening in a number of countries threatened by fascist invasion.
__*_*_*__ __PRINTERS_P_65_COMMENT__ 5-263 65Thus, comrades, the gulf between victorious socialism and decaying parasitic capitalism has grown still wider during the past five years. The U.S.S.R. is moving upwards, to the peaks of a classless society, to communism. The capitalist world is on the downward course to economic crises, reaction, and wars. This means that the general crisis of the capitalist system has become more profound. And the more capitalism becomes entangled in its contradictions, the more desperate are the measures it resorts to in the attempt to escape from its plight. Hence the intensification of the capitalist offensive against the working people, the intensification of fascist terror, the assumption of the offensive by fascism in the international arena, and the new imperialist war. Hence the growing threat of foreign military attack on the land of socialism, the realization of whose significance as a stronghold of peace and of resistance to imperialist conquest and wars is growing immensely in the minds of millions of working people in the capitalist countries.
[66] __ALPHA_LVL2__ II. THE STRUGGLE OF THE COMMUNIST PARTIES FORAs fascism passes to the offensive in different countries and in the international arena, the anti-fascist movement grows and widens and increasingly assumes an international character. The five-year interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses was a period of big anti-fascist battles of the working people. It was a mighty struggle of labour against capital, of the forces of progress against the dark forces of reaction. We had the struggle of the Communist Parties for united working-class action, for trade union unity, and for an anti-fascist Popular Front. We had the formation of the Popular Front in France. We had the development of the democratic movement on the American continent (in North and South America). We had the formation and extension of the national front in a number of colonial and dependent countries. And, above all, we had the national revolutionary war of the heroic Spanish people, and the war of .the great Chinese people for national liberation from the invading imperialist robbers.
You remember, comrades, how after the advent of fascism to power in Germany in 1933 the fascists raised their heads in other capitalist countries, and how they hastened to pass to the offensive in the expectation that |he masses would retreat before them without a fight, as was the case in Germany. But you also remember that it was just the victory of German fascism that, a year later, started a powerful anti-fascist movement all over the world. In February 1934 the workers of France answered the fascist offensive by a general strike, which embraced four million people; in Austria the workers took to arms; in Spain, in October of the same year, the Asturian miners carried on a fight for two weeks. Everywhere the driving force of this mass resistance lo fascism was the Communist Parties, which in the process of the struggle forged the united action of the working class, the united action of all working people.
__PRINTERS_P_67_COMMENT__ 5* 67Applying the great Leninist-Stalinist strategic plan of uniting the forces of the proletariat and of enlisting the allies of the working class, the Communist International, in Comrade Dimitrov's report at its Seventh Congress, advanced the tactics of a united working-class front and anti-fascist Popular Front to combat the capitalist offensive, fascism, and the impending imperialist war. The speech of Comrade Dimitrov, that staunch disciple of Comrade Stalin, who held aloft the banner of communism in Leipzig, found an ardent response among the working people of the capitalist countries.
What were the immediate results of the anti-fascist movement that, began in almost every capitalist country?
In France, the working people, by means of a general strike and mjass demonstrations, involving nearly a million persons in Paris alone, defeated the fascist putsch of February 6, 1934, secured a law dissolving the armed fascist leagues, and, in the process of the antifascist struggle, established a united working-class front and a Popular Front. The powerful strike movement in the summer of 1936,; which was accompanied by the occupation of the factories, secured for the working class the 40-hour week, wage increases of as much as 30 per cent, vacations paid for by the employers, collective agreements, and employers' recognition of the trade unions in the factories. Trade union unity was achieved, with the result that in the course of a few months the membership of the General Confederation of Labour increased from 900,000 to 4,000,000. The Communist Party increased its membership sevenfold; its influence over the working masses grew, which meant that the working masses grew stronger in the struggle against fascism.
In the U.S.A., the anti-fascist movement swept aside demagogues of the type of Father Coughlin. A Left wing, known as the Committee for Industrial Organization, emerged from the reactionary American Federation of Labour, leading the larger section of fthe American labour movement in the adoption of the position of the class struggle. Taking advantage of an improvement in the economic situation, the working class organized a number of big strikes, which in the majority of cases ended in victory for the workers. There were strikes of one million textile workers, four hundred thousand miners, and the workers in other branches of industry. Half a million students organized a demonstration strike against the impending war. The democratic movement grew and won" an enormous victory at the presidential elections. On the wave of this movement, the Communist Party of the U.S.A. increased in size.
68In Spain, the armed fighting in Asturias, followed by mass strikes and huge demonstrations, led to the fall of the Lerroux-Gil Robles government. On February 16, 1936, the Popular Front won a big victory at the elections.
In Great Britain, Holland, Belgium and Rumania, would-be fascist dictators, like Mosley, Mussert, Degrelle and Cordiarios, suffered a headlong fall.
In Mexico, Cuba and Chile, the democratic movement was victorious. Mass trade unions were formed: about eight hundred thousand workers were united in the Mexican Confederation of Labour, four hundred thousand in the Cuban Confederation, and two hundred thousand in the Chilean Confederation.
In China, there was a rapid development of the movement of the masses for the freedom, independence and unity of China, for the establishment of a democratic system, and for the economic, political and national regeneration of the country.
In India, a strike movement developed. The three-month strike of the jute workers in Bengal alone involved 225,000 persons. The nation-wide movement against the reactionary 1935 constitution gathered strength; in the two years 1937 and 1938 the membership of the National Congress increased from 630,000 to four million.
In the French colonies of Indo-China, Algiers, Tunis and Syria, the working masses, as a result of the victory of the Popular Front in France, secured a number of democratic liberties. Here also, as in India, a nation-wide front of struggle against imperialist oppression was built up.
The reactionary bourgeoisie, scared by the sweep of the antifascist movement, furiously resisted the development of the united working-class front and the Popular Front. In France, by sabotaging production, exporting capital and gold, artificially forcing up prices, and speculating on the devaluation of the franc, it tried to discredit the Popular Front and pave the way for the capitulation of the government which enjoyed the support of the Popular Front. In Spain, the landlords worked to bring about a famine by leaving their lands uncultivated; the bankers and capitalists engineered economic dislocation, and the generals plotted a revolt with the object of putting an end to the Popular Front. In China, Japanese agents endeavoured to incite the Kuomintang against the Chinese Soviets and employed every means to stir up internecine war, so as to disrupt the growing national front at all costs.
69However, it was becoming ever clearer that the reactionaries were unable with their own internal forces to cope with the Popular Front in France and Spain, or to disrupt the national emancipation movement of the Chinese people. World reaction came to their aid. The reactionary circles of the British bourgeoisie brought tremendous pressure to bear on the home and foreign policy of France in order to direct it into the channel they desired. In Spain, German and Italian fascism passed on to open intervention. In the Far East, the Japanese militarists launched a big war against the Chinese people.
The peoples who were victims of aggression put up armed resistance. The Spanish and Chinese peoples started their heroic struggle against the foreign invaders. This struggle is the most important event in the life of the nations since the Great Socialist Revolution and jts magnificent victories, and since the revolutionary movements of 1918-23 in Europe. The significance of this struggle is enormous. It is fettering the forces of the aggressors, checking the further spread of the second imperialist war, facilitating the struggle of the world proletariat against its exploiters, and assisting the anti-fascist movement in all countries.
When they engineered the mutiny of the generals in Spain, the German and Italian fascists expected 'an easy and rapid victory. They thought that the comic-opera march on Rome in 1922 could be duplicated in Spain. They thought it would be one of those military coups of which there have been many examples in the history of Spain, and that it would end in one night with the victory of the general who was seeking to mount the pedestal of a fascist dictator. The Spanish people has shown by its heroic struggle that the time of easy victories for fascism is passing. The intervention in Spain has cost the German and Italian fascists about a thousand million American dollars, and has involved them in an enormous loss of war material and a considerable loss of man-power and trained army cadres.
For nearly three years the poorly-armed Spanish people, betrayed by the so-called bourgeois-democratic states, has been waging an unequal and heroic struggle for its independence, for the cause of the whole of progressive and advanced humanity. (Applause.) It has had to contend in this struggle against the military intervention of two big imperialist powers, fascist Italy and Germany, as well as against the veiled intervention of world reaction, which has blockaded the Spanish Republic under the hypocritical guise, in Europe, of "a policy of non-intervention" and, in America, of a policy of "isolation.''
70The Republic has had to overcome incredible difficulties in this period. The Republic had no army. Under the fire of the enemy, it has created a people's army which has inscribed in the history of the national-revolutionary war of the Spanish people such chapters as the battles of Madrid, Guadalajara, Jarama and the Ebro. The Republic had no officers. Thousands of staunch commanders and splendid political commissars were trained in the process of the struggle; the ranks of the Spanish people have produced men like Modesto and Lister, whose names are pronounced with affection and respect by every honest anti-fascist, and with hatred by all enemies of the Spanish people. The Republic had no munitions industry. It built one as it went along. Old men and boys, Spanish mothers and girls put their heart and soul into this work. The Republic had no fortifications; the Spanish people took pick and spade and fortified the fronts for the republican armies.
How was it that the Spanish Republic performed the miracle of holding out so long on its comparatively small peninsula, contending against blockade and the vast superiority of its adversary in armaments? 'This miracle was made possible by the establishment of unity of action of the working class, by the formation of a close alliance between the working class and the peasantry, by the union of the masses of Spain in an anti-fascist Popular Front, and by the fact that this front was cemented by the Communist Party, which had grown into a great political force; it was made possible by the international support given the Spanish people by the working people, and above all the political support given them-by the nations of the Soviet Union and by the father of all working people---Comrade Stalin. (Stormy applause.)
For nearly three years the struggle of the Spanish people has focussed the attention of the entire world. It has everywhere aroused the admiration of millions of working people and the savage fury of the world reactionaries. The example of the Spanish people has served as a clarion call to all other peoples to resist the fascist warmongers; it has helped to consolidate the forces of peace and liberty in all capitalist countries. A mass movement of solidarity embracing nearly every country of the world has rallied around Republican Spain. It is the most powerful movement of solidarity of the working people since the imperialist intervention in the land of the Soviets. It has manifested itself in various forms, ranging from collections of money, mass meetings, demonstrations and the organization of committees for the defence of Spain to political strikes and the 71 formation of volunteer units. Record demonstrations were held in the LatinAmerican countries; far-off India held a national, day of solidarity with Spain.
The movement of solidarity with the Spanish people has penetrated into the fascist countries. In Italy, anti-fascists take up secret collections, distribute thousands of leaflets, chalk anti-fascist mottoes on houses at night; there are increasing cases of sabotage in munitions plants, and of soldiers refusing to embark to fight Republican Spain.
This solidarity movement has been developing everywhere into a struggle of the working people against fascism in their own countries, into an international struggle of anti-fascist forces against world reaction. Help for Republican Spain has become a platform for a spontaneously formed international united working-class front.
At the other end of the world the four hundred and fifty millions of a vast country, the biggest nation in the world, whom the imperialist robbers have always ground down, beaten, plundered and humiliated, have risen in defence of their country and their national independence. The war in China is the biggest war for national emjancipation in a semi-colonial country history has ever known. Its importance is all the greater in that it is being waged by the Chinese people against an imperialist state which performs the role of gendarme of all the forces of world reaction in the Far East. In the course of this struggle the Chinese people have put an end to the internecine warfare which was rending the country to pieces and are forging their national unity ---which is what the imperialists have always feared most of all. China's war against Japanese imperialism is becoming more and more a war of the entire nation. In spite of Japan's superiority in military equipment, the Chinese people are offering stubborn resistance to the enemy, attacking him in the rear, encircling him with a ring of guerrilla detachments, destroying the Japanese lines of commiunication, and exhausting and undermining the strength of the enemy by a protracted war.
Japan's war on China has cost her 2,500,000,000 American dollars, yet the Japanese fascist militarists have not become masters in China. The Japanese troops hold railway lines and urban centres, but a huge part of the country, with its Chinese inhabitants, remains under the control of the national Chinese government. Chinese administration and Chinese law function in the rear of the Japanese forces of occupation; there, too, mobilization is conducted for the Chinese national army. The watchword of the national war passes from mouth to mouth: "When the father falls in battle, the son takes his place; 72 brother takes the place of brother, and wife takes the place of husband.''
The stubborn resistance of the Chinese people is having an increasing effect in revolutionizing the working masses of Japan, who are languishing under the yoke of oppression, monstrous exploitation and the intolerable burden of taxation. The difficulties encountered by the Japanese militarists are stimulating the growth of opposition sentiments among all sections of the people ;and accentuating the contradictions even in the camp of the ruling classes. The strike movement is gaining impetus, and the discontent of the Japanese labouring masses with the protracted war is growing. Exhausted by continuous battles, confronted with a nation that is defending its country, the Japanese soldiers are beginning to lose patience. More and more frequent are the symptoms of ferment in the army of the Japanese invaders. The heroic struggle of the Chinese people is not only demoralizing the Japanese army and the Japanese rear; it is also serving to stir up the masses of Asia and to awaken all the colonial peoples. The example set by the Chinese people in forming a national front against the Japanese has placed in the hands of the oppressed colonial peoples a mighty weapon for their national emancipation, a weapon tried and tested by the experience of a vast country, by the experience of millions.
"Of course, the heroic struggle of the Chinese people and their army against the Japanese invaders, the tremendous national revival in China, her huge resources of man-power and territory, and, lastly, the determination */ the Chinese National Government to fight the struggle for emancipation to a finish, until the invaders are completely driven out from Chinese territory, all goes to show beyond a doubt that there is no future for the Japanese imperialists in China, and never will be." (History of the C.P.S.UJBJ---Short Course, p. 333.)
But the longer the intervention in Spain and the war in China dragged on, the more uneasy world reaction became. The duel between fascism and the anti-fascist forces threatened to end unfavourably for the fascist aggressors. The people began to grumble against the military adventures of the fascist governments. More frequently and loudly were voices raised among the masses, asking: "Where are they leading us?" The internal isolation of fascism and the shrinking of its social base became more and more apparent. In Germany the workers became ever more incensed at their appalling conditions, at the introduction of the 14-hour days their lack of rights, and their 73 being tied to the factories like serfs; the peasants became ever more incensed at the brazen interference of the fascist authorities in their affairs, the robbery of "Fuhrers," big and little; the petty bourgeois were discontented because the fascist rulers were deliberately driving them into the abyss of ruin in order to secure cheap labour power; the Catholic masses were stirred into action by the ill-usage to which they were subjected by fascism; opposition was growing in the ranks of the Reichswehr, which, feared defeat in the war for which fascism was working; the German people grew increasingly incensed at the venality, peculation and tyranny of the corrupt fascist bureaucracy. The Gestapo met this wave of discontent with new bestial repressions, with the block and the axe, and with Jewish pogroms, reviving the gloomy days of the Middle Ages. Himmler, the chief of the Gestapo, demanded the reinforcement of the S.S. Troops in order to develop operations in "the internal theatre of war.''
The British reactionaries, in their endeavour to help German fascism extricate itself from its internal difficulties and strengthen its position in the fight against the anti-fascist forces, allowed it to seize Austria and obligingly opened the doors of Czechoslovakia to it. In preparation for the Munich deal they and the French reactionaries brought pressure to bear on the Czechoslovakian government, demanding that it capitulate and behave in the "Austrian manner." The Czech people and their army wanted to behave in the Spanish manner. The partial mobilization undertaken in France and Britain with the object of hoodwinking the masses was transformed into a demonstration of anti-fascist sentiments, whila the mobilization in Germany revealed that indignation against the fascist rulers as the true instigators of war was widespread among the people.
The Munich deal, which sacrificed Czechoslovakia to German fascism, was a conspiracy of reaction against the international working class, against the anti-fascist movement in all countries, against peace and against the freedom of all nations. It was a conspiracy against the Spanish Republic. The seizure of Catalonia by the interventionists was a direct consequence of Munich. It was hatched not only in Rome and Berlin but also in London and Paris. The whole world knew that, having succeeded in forcing Prague to capitulate, the Munich politicians would descend upon Republican Spain. The Munich deal gave German and Italian fascism an entirely free hand in their intervention in Spain.
When the Italian and German forces of intervention seized Catalonia the British and French reactionaries dropped their mask. From 74 covert intervention they passed to open intervention. At the orders of Berlin and Rome, they made haste to recognize Franco. They engineered the treacherous operation which transferred the naval base of Minorca to the Italian and German interventionists. The French reactionaries, having systematically refused to hand over Spain's gold reserve in France to the lawful Republican government of Spain, subserviently tendered it to Franco, the creature of world reaction. The British bankers, with the blessing of the Conservative circles of Great Britain, expressed their readiness to grant the Spanish rebels a loan to cover the expenses of the German and Italian intervention and to save the internal regime of the Spanish fascists from collapse. More, the British and French reactionaries, with the aid of treasonable elements inside Spain, engineered a counter-- revolutionary coup in Madrid and Carthagena in order to break the resistance of the Spanish people to the interventionists at the gravest stage of the struggle.
But world reaction will not bring the Spanish people to their knees. Only a madman can think that this proud and freedom-loving people will reconcile themselves to the colonial dependence to which world reaction is seeking to reduce their country; only a madman can think that they will humbly bow their backs to Franco, the traitor, adventurer and agent of foreign fascism. In spite of all the support of world reaction, neither kings nor dictators, neither Alfonsos nor Primo de Riveras have succeeded in staying on the backs of the Spanish people. How then can this monster who has destroyed Spanish cities and villages with German artillery, who has slaughtered thousands of Spanish women and children with Italian bombs, this butcher who has drenched Spain with blood and who has been spurned and anathemized by the Spanish people, expect to stay on their backs? (Voice from the floor: "Hear, hear!" Applause.)
World reaction will not succeed in erasing from the memory of the Spanish people the heroic struggle of almost three years against the foreign invaders. This people has known better days. It has held arms in its hands; it has sown the land of the landlords for itself; it has organized production in the mills and factories itself; it has tasted a life of freedom. Such a people will never be subjugated. (Loud applause.) Its sacrifices will be repaid a hundredfold. They will remain forever in the minds of the working people, an indelible memory of the infamy, not only of the fascist governments, but also of their British and French abettors, and of all the exploiting classes. They will raise a storm of hatred among the peoples against their exploiters, and 75 will transform the revolutionary indignation of the masses into great revolutionary deeds of the peoples. The French reactionaries are mistaken if they think that their treacherous policy towards Republican Spain will put an end to the working-class and anti-fascist movements in France. It is true that this infamous policy has encouraged all the opponents of the Popular Front. The agents of the bourgeoisie who insinuated themselves into the ranks of the Popular Front in order to destroy it from within have come out into the open. All the capitulators who were driven by the wave of the revolutionary movement to the anti-fascist shores have now raised their heads. These enemies of the Popular Front have now thrown off all restraint; they are firing on Communists in Madrid, demanding the disruption of the united working-class front in France, and working for the liquidation of the Popular Front movement in other countries. By ridding itself of this treacherous capitulating scum the anti-fascist movement will only become stronger and more effective in the fight.
The treacherous policy of the Munich politicians is stirring into action sections which have hitherto held aloof from the political struggle; it has given the signal for a concentration of forces against world reaction on a broader basis than the Popular Front; it is giving an impetus to a new rise of the anti-fascist movement all over the world, and in Great Britain in the first place; it is helping to ripen in the minds of the masses the idea of storming the citadel of capitalism.
But, comrades, could the conspiracy of world reaction against the Spanish Republic have been foiled? Undoubtedly it could. It could have been foiled if the international proletariat had united its forces from the very beginning of the national revolutionary war of the Spanish people, if the leadership of the Second International had accepted the proposal of the Communist International to establish united action to combat the offensive of capital, fascism and imperialist war.
The Executive Committee of the Communist International has proposed unity of action ten times in the past five years. What reply did we get from the reactionary leaders of the Socialist International? They replied that international united action required the preliminary formation of a united front in the various countries. When the Sections of the Comintern approached the various Social-Democratic Parties, the leaders of these parties replied that it was first necessary to reach agreement on an international scale. When the fighting in the Asturias was at its height the leaders of the Second International cynically proposed that the Communist International should-wait a few months 76 until their Executive Committee held its meeting. The Executive Committee met; the majority of its Sections voted for international united action, but the British Labourites were against united action. And the majority submitted to the Citrines and Morrisons; they submitted to the will of the reactionary British bourgeoisie that stood behind their backs.
Yet, if the international proletariat had united its forces it could have enforced the opening of the frontiers to Republican Spain, it could have prevented the blockade of Republican Spain, it could have helped the Spanish people to victory, and thereby would have averted the occupation of Austria and the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia and prevented the very possibility of the Munich conspiracy. It could have brought about the defeat of Italian fascism in Abyssinia and compelled the bourgeois governments really to apply the sanctions proclaimed by the League of Nations. It could have aroused world public opinion against Japan, prevented her receiving raw materials and munitions, and brought the Japanese militarists to bay. But the capitulators of the Second International did not want this, for they dread the victory of the Popular Front more than the victory of fascism.
Is it still possible to arrest the further development of the second imperialist war and to defeat fascism? Yes, it is, although it is harder now than before.
What is needed now to defeat the fascist aggressors?
Firstly, a resolute struggle against the capitulators, carried to the point of unmasking them completely, isolating them and routing them. The capitulators are not only collaborating with the bourgeoisie, they are collaborating with the most reactionary part of the bourgeoisie,, with fascism. The capitulators are lieutenants of fascism in the labour movement, acting under the mask of ``pacifism'' in order to dupe the masses. In 1933 the reactionary leaders of the Social-Democratic Party brought the people of Germany under the axe of the fascist dictatorship, fooling the masses by asserting that they were saving them from civil war. The capitulators today are helping the bourgeoisie to drag the nations into imperialist wars, while claiming that they are saving the cause of peace, saving the nations from war. They are paving the way for war by the same methods they employed when they paved the way for the establishment of the fascist dictatorship. On the pretext that they wish to preserve peace they exhort the peoples to retreat before the fascist aggressors. Like Otto Bauer, they surrender one position after another to fascism while threatening to 77 ``take to arms when attacked." But in the meantime they surrender Austria, the Sudeten region and Czechoslovakia to German fascism, allow it to entrench itself in the Danube basin and in the Balkans, surrender Spain to be ravaged by the interventionists, and yield to the fascist aggressors all the approach roads for aggression against other nations.
They try to demoralize the masses with the vile and treacherous slogan: "Better slavery than war." But the people know that the imperialist robbers convert their slaves into cannon fodder for their wars of plunder. Slaves do not escape war; they have to fight on the side of their enslavers, who use them to throttle the independence of other nations.
The British and French capitulators cherish the dream of diverting German fascism to the East. This is also called preservation of peace in the language of these gentlemen. But we know that the German fascists dislike impassable roads and insurmountable obstacles; they prefer to go where the going is easiest, where people capitulate to fascism.
The capitulators of the neutral countries, the Scandinavian, for instance, propose to weather the storm of war in a refuge of `` neutrality'' and to help their bourgeois enrich themselves on military contracts, as they did in 1914-18. But times are different now. Today the fascist aggressors will not leave a single neighbouring state in peace until they have drawn it into the orbit of their military adventures, until they have revised its frontiers in the interests of the "Aryan race."
The capitulators try to frighten the masses by asserting that the Popular Front provokes the fascists to aggression. But the formation of a Popular Front means resisting the fascist aggressors. It is not resistance but the absence of it that whets the appetite of the fascists.
The capitulators go around insinuating to the masses: "See how much Spain has suffered. Isn't it better to surrender without a struggle like Czechoslovakia?" But if the peoples were to follow these suicidal promptings, fascism would now be master in Europe. If Spain had gone the way of Czechoslovakia, other peoples, and the French in the first place, would today be the victims of fascist aggression.
Secondly, in order to defeat the fascist aggressors action is needed, backed by the arguments of material force---the action of the states against whom fascist aggression is really directed (France, Britain and the United States). The world reactionaries are deliberately creating the legend of the might of German fascism in order to weaken the 78 people's determination to resist. Fascist Germany is not prepared for a big and serious war---she has not enough raw material and foodstuffs; her financial position is critical; her coasts are vulnerable to naval blockade; her army is inadequately officered; her rear is a dangerous one for fascism. The superiority of material force is undoubtedly on the side of the so-called democratic states. These states have three times the population of the bloc of aggressors, they produce from fifty to one hundred per cent more steel, twice as much electricity, fourteen times as many automobiles, fifty-five times as much liquid fuel, nine times as much raw material for textiles, four times as much food. They can meet their own requirements in raw material completely, whereas even in peace time the bloc of aggressors has a deficit of 50-55 per cent. Their gold reserves are forty-nine times greater than the gold reserves of the fascist states. Their potential production of aircraft, mechanical traction for the army, and other technical equipment and munitions far exceeds the boldest calculations of the fascist bloc. The naval forces of France, Britain, and the United States are twice as strong as the naval forces of Germany, Italy and Japan.
If the so-called democratic states pursued a firm policy of resistance to' the fascist aggressors, combined with economic pressure, this would be a quite effective means of forcing the fascist states to retreat. This would be a real policy of peace. It would be supported by all the peoples. It would bring back to the side of France, England and the United States the small states which the Munich policy has thrown into confusion and dismay. It would be a policy of consolidating the democratic gains of the peoples that would be supported by the international working class.
But in order to bring about such a turn in the policy of the socalled democratic states, it is necessary that the working class also bring the forces of material pressure to bear on the bourgeois governments. The weapons of the working class are strikes, mass demonstrations, and popular movements against wars of plunder. The use of these weapons will be the more effective the sooner the working class establishes international unity of action. To combat wars of plunder there must be joint action by the proletarians of all countries.
79 __ALPHA_LVL2__ III. THE COMMUNIST MOVEMENT IN THE CAPITALISTI shall now pass to the third part of my speech, which will deal with the condition of the international Communist movement. First a few remarks on some questions of Communist Party tactics.
The second imperialist war is developing in a situation which differs from that of the first imperialist war, the war of 1914-18. Unlike 1914-18, the world today is divided into two diametrically opposed systems: the world of capitalism and the world of socialism. Now there are not only imperialist states, but imperialist states which have established a fascist regime, which are trying to imposeX tMs regime on other nations by force of arms, and which are acting as instigators of wars of plunder.
"A distinguishing feature of the second imperialist war is that so far it is being waged and extended by the aggressor powers, while the other powers, the `democratic' powers, against whom in fact the war is directed, pretend that it does not concern them, wash their hands of it, draw back, boast of their love of peace, scold the fascist aggressors, and .. . surrender their positions to the aggressors bit by bit, at the same time asserting that they are preparing to resist." (History of the C.P.S.U.[BJ----Short Course, pp. 333-334.)
The fascist states have begun to divide up Europe, they are " selfdeter mining" the small nations by force, they are demanding a redivision of colonies.
In view of this new situation, the Communists must define their attitude to present wars, to the colonial claims of the fascist states, 80 and to the attempts of the fascist demagogues to exploit the slogan of "national self-determination.''
In conformity with the teachings of Marxism-Leninism, the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)---Short Course divides wars into just wars and unjust wars.
``a) Just wars, wars that are not wars of conquest but wars of liberation, waged to defend the people from foreign attack and from attempts to enslave them, or to liberate the people from capitalist slavery, or, lastly, to liberate colonies and dependent countries from the yoke of imperialism; and
``b) Unjust wars, wars of conquest, waged to conquer and enslave foreign countries and foreign nations" (History of the C.P.S.UJBJ---Short Course, pp. 167-168.)
This description provides the clue for Communists when defining what the attitude of the working people should be towards each specific war. This means that the working people will support the just war waged by any people against the imperialist marauders for its national independence. They will support a war that speeds the defeat of world reaction, and of its shock troops---Germany, Japan and Italy. They will support a war that hastens the victory of the world proletariat, whose interests fully and completely coincide with those of the land of victorious socialism, the fatherland of all working people.
Communists consider it their cardinal duty to mobilize the working people of all countries to assist any nation waging a just war, so as to promote its victory in every way.
The description of just and unjust wars given in the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.) helps the Communists to define a clear Leninist-Stalinist policy towards the struggle now flaring up among the imperialist robbers for supremacy over the colonial peoples.
Communists are thoroughly consistent in opposing all oppression and enslavement of colonial peoples by the imperialists. It is not their business to defend the existing colonial empires. All the more irreconcilable is their hostility to the colonial claims of the fascist states, which would impose an even worse slavery on the colonial peoples. Communists support the movements in the colonies for the formation of a national front of struggle against imperialist oppression, and work for the establishment of united action of the working class of the home countries and the oppressed peoples of their colonies. They demand of-the imperialist governments of the so-called bourgeois-- __PRINTERS_P_81_COMMENT__ 6---263 81 democratic states an immediate and radical improvement in the conditions of the toiling masses in the colonies and the granting ^)f broad democratic rights and liberties to the colonies.
At the same time, Communists denounce the cynical deception practised by the fascist warmongers in trying to exploit the discontent of the colonial peoples for their own rapacious ends. While upholding the right of the colonial peoples to self-determination, including even secession, Communists follow the teachings of Lenin and Stalin in subordinating the actual realization of this right of secession to the fundamental interests of the struggle of the colonial peoples themselves for emancipation, to the interests of defeating fascism, that most vicious enemy of the working people, and to the interests of the victory of the international working class over its exploiters.
The description given in the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.) also helps the Communists to adopt a correct attitude towards fascist speculation on the slogan of "national self-determination." The fascist warmongers, who have crushed their own peoples and are enslaving other peoples, are trying to turn the democratic slogan of "national self-- determination" into a counter-revolutionary weapon for the furtherance of their own aggressive plans. Hypocritically adopting the guise of supporters of national self-determination, they are trying to disintegrate the multi-national capitalist states which lie in the path of " fascist expansion and to convert the smaller countries into a base for their offensive against other states.
Consistently combating all forms of national oppression in the capitalist countries, defending the right of the oppressed nations to self-determination, including even secession, and calling upon the oppressed nations to fight for the establishment of mutual relations on the lines indicated by the great example of the Stalinist commonwealth of nations of the U.S.S.R.---the Communists concentrate their main fire in the present specific historical situation on the fraudulent fascist "self-determination of nations," which is the most cynical attempt to deceive the oppressed peoples and an atrocious crime against the freedom and independence of nations. Communists lay prime emphasis on the struggle for the achievement of self-determination by the nations enslaved by the fascist states. They demand free selfdetermination for Austria, which was forcibly annexed by fascist Germany on the eve of the plebiscite, and for the Sudeten region, which Germany seized from Czechoslovakia, free self-determination for Korea, Formosa and Abyssinia, and the evacuation of Spain and China by the imperialist robbers.
82 __ALPHA_LVL3__ B. The Condition of the Communist PartiesAt the time of the Seventeenth Party Congress the membership of the Communist International in the capitalist countries numbered 860,000. Today the membership is 1,200,000. The number of Y.C.L. members and young revolutionaries affiliated to the Young Communist International has increased from 110,000 to 746,000. Altogether, this constitutes an army of nearly two million.
However, these figures do not give a picture of the real organized strength of the Communist Parties. There are tens of thousands of Communists working devotedly in enforced secrecy who are not covered by any statistics. The Communists of China who left the Soviet district of Kiangsi in 1935 marched a distance of 12,000 kilometres with the Red Army and performed extensive political work among the masses on the way. The nuclei they set up are alive, functioning and active, although they are not registered anywhere.
Our statistics do not include the tens of thousands of Communists who are languishing in prisons and concentration camps. Every Section of the Communist International has a following of militant workingmen who carry on activities under the guidance of the Party and whose numbers several times exceed the membership of the Party.
Besides this active following, each Communist Party has a wider circle of, workers who are devoted to it, believe in it and support it. The Belgian Communist Party is not large numerically, it has only 7,000 members; but at the last municipal elections it secured 160,000 votes. The Communist Party of Holland has 10,000 members, but 137,000 people voted for it. An analysis of election results and of other indications of the influence of the Communist Parties permits us to draw the conclusion that every Party member represents a following of at least fifteen or twenty workers.
The Communists have increased their influence in the trade union movement: in a number of countries the self-sacrificing efforts of the Communists have won them the confidence of the rank-and-file trade union members, who have promoted them to leading positions in the trade union movement.
However, the growth of the Communist Parties in the various countries during the past five years has been uneven. There has been an increase in the size and strength of those which have been waging an armed struggle against the nefarious invasion of their countries, like the Spanish and Chinese Communist Parties. There has been an increase of Communist Party membership in countries where the __PRINTERS_P_83_COMMENT__ 6* 83 proletariat has been able to stand firm against reaction, and where its struggle has been supported by the peasants and small townsfolk's, for instance, in France. There has been a growth in the membership of Communist Parties which exist more or less legally, and where the Social-Democrats are weak, as, for instance, in the United States and in many Latin-American countries. The growth of the Communist Parties has been much slower in countries where the Social-Democrats are strong and where their reactionary leaders have disrupted the unity of the working class and the working people; I refer to Great Britain and the Scandinavian countries. The growth of the Communist Parties has been greatly retarded in countries where the labour movement has been crushed, especially in countries under totalitarian fascist dictatorships.
Among the Communist Parties which have grown in the period under review, one of the foremost places belongs to the heroic Communist Party of Spain, a party which has thoroughly mastered Comrade Stalin's wise counsel that real Bolsheviks should be "free ofdall panic, from any semblance of panic, when things begin to grow complicated and some danger or other looms on the horizon." Since 1931 the Spanish Communist Party has grown from a membership of eight hundred into a mighty party of three hundred thousand, a party that has been .through a schooling of illegal existence, revolution, civil war, and war against foreign counter-revolutionary intervention. It is a model of a real people's party, whose deep roots among the masses of workers and peasants no fascist terror can destroy.
The Communist Party of Spain has won great prestige among all sections of the people by its correct policy, in which the centre of all its care and thoughts is the achievement of the victory of the Spanish people over their enemies. It has won the confidence of the people by its supreme heroism. The people have seen how it has rushed into the most dangerous places at moments of greatest peril. It has been the first to enter battle and the last to quit the field. It has won the affection of the people because it has proved itself by its Bolshevik deeds. It has produced such splendid people, such staunch Stalinists as Jose Diaz and Dolores Ibarruri (applause), the pride of the entire international Communist movement.
Another Section of the Comintern to play an important role in the life of its country and its people is the Chinese Communist Party. It now numbers 148,000 members; it is connected not only with the workers, but with wide masses of peasants, and also enjoys considerable influence among the intelligentsia, especially the students.
84The Communist Party of China is an armed section of the Chinese people. It is a party steeled and tempered in the fire of years of civil war and war for national emancipation; it has accumulated in the past the experience of the Soviet movement and of the organization of a Soviet power; it has a wealth of experience in the organization of a broad partisan movement, which is of such value in the present national war in China.
It is highly skilled in the art of demoralizing the enemy's forces, of penetrating deep into the enemy's rear and conducting extensive political work in the enemy's army. The Chinese Communist Party is at present growing fastest in the districts embraced by the partisan movement, in the rear of the Japanese army.
It is a model of tenacity and flexibility in consolidating and developing the national front, which is the basic condition for victory over the Japanese imperialist invaders. A strong point of the Chinese Communist Party is its work in training and promoting new cadres. The Chinese Communist Party has fine people like Mao Tse-tung and Chu Teh, who successfully cotmibine the qualities of political leaders and talented generals. (Applause.)
The Communist Party of France was the pioneer in the struggle for the anti-fascist Popular Front. In these five years its membership has grown from 40,000 to 270,000. In the same period the circulation of I'Humanite, its central organ, has increased from 120,000 to 350,000 copies. L'Humanite has the third largest circulation in France, outdistancing dozens of bourgeois newspapers like Le Temps, Le Matin, and others. The circulation of the Communist Party's provincial press amounts to 470,000 copies.
The number of votes obtained by the Party at the last parliamentary elections, in 1936, reached one and a half million, or 90 per cent more than at the previous elections. In Paris and its suburbs the Communist Party won 33 seats out of 60---an absolute majority. It is the strongest party in the Paris department, especially in the big metal works. The strength of the French Communists lies in the great confidence they enjoy among the masses in the trade unions. They have won this confidence by their valiant fight for the unity and consolidation of the trade unions, and for the immediate demands of the working people. In developing the anti-fascist movement the Communist Party of France has invoked the best revolutionary traditions of its working class and its people. It has done tremendous work in rendering effective aid to the Spanish Republic.
Considerable progress has been made by the Cornjmumst Party of 85 the U.S.A. By doing its utmost to assist in shaping the class movement of the proletariat and in separating it from the bourgeois parties, it has increased its membership from 20,000 to 90,000. Its membership has grown because its work has helped to strengthen the industrialunions, which have as many as four million members, and because it has worked tirelessly and patiently among the three and a half million workers who belong to the reactionary American Federation of Labour for the restoration of trade union unity on the basis of the class struggle. The Party has won great prestige among the Negro workers and also among the best representatives of the American intelligentsia. By participating in the broad democratic movement and criticizing its irresoluteness, the Communist Party of the U.S.A. has set this movement on the path of a more consistent struggle against fascism. One of the Party's serious defects is that it still lacks sufficient contact with the farmer masses and the farmers' movement.
The Communist Party of Great Britain can record a certain growth in membership---from 6,000 to 18,000; its influence in the trade unions and in the Labour Party has also grown. Although rejected by the leadership of the Labour Party, the British Communist Party's application to affiliate to the Labour Party was supported by 1,400 trade union and local Labour Party organizations. Its campaign for the formation of a Popular Front in Britain is meeting with even greater response. Cripps' Memorandum in favour of the Popular Front received 250,000 signatures in the space of a few days.
Yet, despite all these achievements, the British Communist Party is one of the sections of the Comintern which is lagging most. It has not succeeded in reaching the main body of the British working class, which bears a tremendous responsibility for the fact that the policy of the British reactionaries with regard to the blockade of the Spanish Republic was not thwarted in good time by action on its part.
All the legal Parties have progressed as a result of an improvement in their work in the trade unions, their struggle for the united front and the Popular Front, and their activity in assisting the Spanish people. The Communist Party of Canada, for instance, has increased its membership from 8,000 to 18,000; the Communist Party of Cuba from 3,000 to 23,000; the Communist Party of Mexico from 2,000 to 30,000; the Communist Party of Sweden from 8,000 to 19,000; the Communist Party of Denmark from 3,000 to 9,000. The Communist Parties have grown in certain of the colonial countries, wherever they have succeeded in taking an active part in the movement for the anti-imperialist national front and in winning, together with the 86 masses, at least some modicum of democratic rights and liberties. This period has witnessed the outlawing of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, which had 60,000 members before it became illegal. It has been able to preserve its leading people and the main body of its membership even while existing illegally.
Severe blows have been suffered by the Communist movement in the countries under the heel of fascist dictatorship, particularly in Germany, Japan and Italy. The bourgeoisie casts tens of thousands of Communists into prisons and concentration camps, executes them with a£d without trial, nefariously assassinates them. It surrounds the workers with a system of spying in the houses where they live, in the factories where they work, and in the fascist organizations into which it tries to drive them. It sets the fascist riff-raff on them, accusing them of "high treason.''
How do the Communists work in these countries? In the conditions obtaining under a totalitarian fascist dictatorship it is difficult for them to build a Party organization centralized from top to bottom. They form a ramified network of groups consisting of people who have known each other for a long time and are bound by ties of mutual trust. There are hundreds of such groups. They are kept profoundly secret, are mobile and flexible. It is hard for the police to discover them. These groups are strenuously active in their houses, streets and districts. The Communists are further active in the factories. Thanks to their active efforts, the fascists have not been able to win influence in the factories either in Germany or Italy. Lastly, the Communists utilize the fascist mass organizations for their work among the labouring people.
Despite the fact that Comrade Thaelmann, the leader of the German Party, has already been languishing in a fascist jail for six years, despite the very severe handicaps of an illegal existence, the German Communist Party has succeeded in maintaining its organization. It is the only anti-fascist party .conducting mass political work in Germany. (Stormy applause.)
But, unfortunately, the Party remained far too long under the hypnotic influence of its former mass strength, counting on the rapid and easy collapse of the fascist regime. Later, when it readjusted itself and adopted the course of prolonged and painstaking work in gathering together the proletarian forces and consolidating their organization, certain German Communists went to the other extreme. They failed to realize how rapidly the discontent of the masses with the fascist regime was rising, and were caught .unawares by the 87 growth of the anti-fascist sentiments to be observed in recent months in Germany.
The Communist Party of Japan has a tradition of struggle against the predatory plans of the Japanese fascist militarists. It fought the invasion of Manchuria by the Japanese imperialists, holding demonstrations and anti-war strikes and organizing the soldiers and sailors. Since 1937, when the Japanese imperialists again invaded China, the Party has been carrying on intense anti-war work, fighting chauvinism, organizing a wide campaign of assistance for the families of mobilized men and demanding the withdrawal of the Japanese armies from China; it has become the driving force of the movement for a Popular Front. Despite savage terror, the Party has succeeded/in maintaining contact with the masses, although the numerical growth of the Party falls far short of its mass influence.
,We must note the serious weakness of the Italian Communist Party. In all the long years of the fascist dictatorship it has nqt been able to weld together a strong illegal organization, to carry on serious work in the fascist trade unions and other fascist mass organizations, or to wean any considerable section of the younger generation from the influence of fascism. The theory of certain Italian Communists that only defeat in war can bring about the collapse of fascism is in reality but a mask for opportunistic passivity. This to a large extent explains why the Party has been unable to give leadership to the discontent of the masses with the war of Italian fascism in Abyssinia and Spain which has found expression in a number of spontaneous mass actions.
As against the Communist Party of Italy, there are a number of parties functioning in small countries where the fascist dictatorship was established much later than in Italy, which, thanks to their militant activity, are now in the forefront of the illegal Communist Parties. I refer to certain Parties in countries lying in the path of German fascist, penetration to the Near East.
The Communist niovem/ent has suffered greatly from the disrupting activities of the fascist secret services, which do their best to smuggle agents-provocateurs and spies into the Communist ranks. In the past ten years sixty thousand Communists have been arrested in Japan; since 1934 the Central Committee of the Japanese Communist Party has had to be changed four times. The fascist secret services are assisted by Trotsky and the Trotskyites. In Poland, Italy, Japan and Germany the secret services make wide use of Trotsky's vile literary effusions for the purpose of demoralizing imprisoned 88 Communists. On the instructions of the fascist secret services Trotskyites worm their way into the organizations of the Popular Front and of the national emancipation movement in order to disrupt them from within.
In Japan the Trotskyites are known as the "brain trust of the secret service." They work in special schools organized by the police, teaching Japanese spies how to combat the Communist and workingclass movement. In China the Trotskyites act as Japanese military spies. The chief of the Japanese espionage service in Peiping wrote of them in a secret report:
``We should support the group of Trotskyites and promote their success, so that their activities in various parts of China may benefit and advantage the empire, for these Chinese are destructive to the unity of the country. They work with remarkable finesse and skill.''
In Spain the Trotskyites act as spies for fascist Germany and Italy and as agents of the Fifth Column, engineering counter-- revolutionary revolts in the rear of the People's Army. Everywhere, the Trotskyites act as fascist agents-provocateurs in the labour movement, as spies and diversionists against the U.S.S.R. The bourgeois espionage services make wide use of the Trotskyites and every other kind of fascist scum, sending them under the guise of political refugees to do espionage work in the U.S.iS.R.
In order to disrupt the Communist movement the fascist-Trotsky - ite spies attempted to form artificial ``factions'' and ``groups'' in some of the Communist Parties and to stir up a factional struggle. Most contaminated by hostile elements was the Communist Party of Poland, where agents of Polish fascism managed to gain positions of leadership. These scoundrels tried to get the Party to support Pilsudski's fascist coup in May 1926. When this failed, they feigned repentance of their ``May'' error, made a show of self-criticism, and deceived the Comintern just as Lovestone and the police `` factionalists'' of the Hungarian and Yugoslav Parties had once done. And it was the fault of the Comintern workers that they allowed themselves to be deceived by the class enemy, failed to detect his manoeuvres in time, and were late in taking measures against the contamination of the Communist Parties by enemy elements.
What have the Communist Parties done to remedy the consequences of the wrecking and undermining activities of the class enemy? The Communist Parties have drawn the lessons from the 89 trials of the Trotskyite and Bukharinite scoundrels and have made wide use of them to heighten Bolshevik vigilance in their ranks. They have investigated their leading workers and removed those whose political honesty was questionable. They have dissolved illegal organizations which were particularly contaminated and have begun to form new ones in their place. They are carrying on a systematic fight against Trotskyism as an agency of fascism.
One of the most important measures in combating the undermining activities of the enemy and the demoralizing influence of bourgeois ideology on the weaker elements in the Parties is to raise the ideological and political level of the Communist Parties.
If the Communist Parties have overlooked the fact that the Trotskyites had degenerated into "a rabid and unprincipled gang of wreckers, diversionists, spies and murderers, working on the instruction of the espionage services of foreign states," this was due, among other reasons, to the theoretical deficiencies of the Communist Parties.
In the work of remedying the theoretical deficiencies of the Communist Parties, the translation into foreign languages of the classics of Marxism-Leninism---the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin ---and particularly the publication of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)--- Short Course in many languages is of the greatest significance. The Communists in the capitalist countries hailed the appearance of the Short Course with enthusiasm. They realize that this book arms them with an indispensable theoretical weapon, that it will help them to comprehend the development of the revolutionary movement in their countries, its peculiarities and its prospects, in the light of the experience of the Party of Lenin and Stalin.
In some of the Communist Parties the application of the tactics of the united working-class front and the anti-fascist Popular Front has been marked by certain tendencies of a Right-opportunist character---a tendency to minimize the importance of the struggle against the capitulators, to idealize the role of the so-called democratic states, and to gloss over their imperialist character. The appearance of such tendencies, if only in the germ, points to the necessity of intensifying the struggle against opportunism.
While there has undoubtedly been a general improvement in the work of the Communists in the trade unions and some considerable achievements in this field, the majority of the Communist Parties have not yet been able to gain a firm foothold in the trade unions, to form an active following of militant trade unionists and to destroy the influence of the reactionary elements in the! trade union movement.
90The Communist Parties have not yet learned to combat fascist demagogy effectively; they were unable to foil the speculation of German fascism on the national question in the Saar, in Danzig and in the Sudeten region.
They have still a poor grasp of Stalin's great art of foreseeing events, of estimating the part played by the various states, classes and parties in these events, and of anticipating the mano3uvres of the enemy and thwarting his plans in time.
The Communists of the capitalist countries are not sufficiently prepared for abrupt turns of events and have not yet mastered the forms of struggle dictated by the tense international situation. It must however be noted that also in the mastery of these forms of struggle the Communist Parties have accomplished a great deal. The Spanish people will never forget the help the world Communist movement rendered them by forming the International Brigades.
The International Brigades did not consist of Communists only, but it was on their initiative that these brigades were formed and organized. The French Communist Party assigned this work to its most capable workers, its finest organizers. It was no easy task to convey tens of thousands of men through locked frontiers, over seas and even across the Atlantic Ocean.
The bourgeoisie raided the volunteers, persecuted and prosecuted them; but these men defied all obstacles, made their way through mountain paths, by night, waist deep in snow, and in fishing smacks, at the risk of being sunk any minute. The ranks of the volunteers were joined by French proletarians---the descendants of the Paris Communards---by Italian refugees, German anti-fascists, Canadian lumberjacks, who proved to be marvelous snipers, and Polish workers, whose battalion, the Dombrovsky Battalion, was the first to fall upon the enemy forces during the Ebro offensive, having swuta the river without waiting for the pontoon bridges to be built.
The Communist Parties of fifty-three countries were represented in the International Brigades, having sent, in addition to the others who were eager to join, quite a number of Central Committee members and leading Party workers. Among them were men like Hans Beimler, a member of the Central Committee of the German Communist Party, who had been crippled in a German concentration camp, and who fell at Palasete crying, "Rot Front!" There were men like the Hungarian Communist, old Hevesi, who led the Rakosi Battalion in an attack on one of the enemy's concrete fortifications at Huesca, captured it, but, like the battalion commissar, died a heroic 91 death. There were rank-and-filers like John, an English truck driver, who under heavy fire brought water to the men who were tormented with thirst; when mortally wounded, he said: "If Comrade Stalin saw this he would clap me on the back and say: 'Well done, John, you're a fine comrade, John!' " (Thunderous applause.)
Who are these people? They are the men and women of the Stalin era, when heroism has become an inalienable characteristic of the Bolshevik, Party and non-Party. They are men and women of the same Stalin breed who went into the attack at Lake Hassan with the war cry: "For the fatherland, Communism and Stalin!" (The delegates rise to their feet and applaud. Cries of "Long live our great Stalinl" "Hurrah!" Stormy applause.)
The formation of the International Brigades was an indication of the maturity of the world Communist movement, an expression of the Bolshevik schooling of the Sections of the Comintern, a test under fire of the Communist cadres.
And now to sum up.
During the past five years the Communist movement has grown, gained strength and attained to manhood. All the legal parties have grown -in numbers and have increased their influence over the masses. The lagging illegal parties have reorganized their ranks, displaying models of supreme heroism and self-sacrifice in their difficult struggle. Some of the Communist Parties have already become, and others are in the process of becoming, important political factors in the life of their countries. Closer bonds have been forming between the Communist and Social-Democratic workers and between the active members of the Communist and Social-Democratic Parties. The confidence of the workers in the Communists has increased. The Communists have learned to give better expression to the needs and demands of the masses, to speak the language of their working class and their people. The ideological unity of the Communist Parties has grown stronger. In the days of Munich, which split the nations, the bourgeois parties and the Social-Democratic Parties into two camps--- capitulators to fascism and advocates of resistance to fascism---the Communists were the only Party who preserved their monolithic unity, politically and organizationally.
Nevertheless, the numerical growth of the Communist Parties and the growth of their influence among the masses were not commensurate with the demands made on the Sections of the Comintern by the sharpening of the class struggle and the development of the second imperialist world war.
92 __ALPHA_LVL3__ C. The Road of Struggle of the Communist Parties and theFor a successful struggle against fascism and predatory wars, the working people must realize where world reaction is heading, and must outline their own way of foiling the insidious designs of the reactionaries.
What do the reactionaries want? They want to crush the Spanish Republic and establish a system in Spain that will suit the interests of the German and Italian interventionists and the British and French bankers; then to turn their attention to France, to strike at the Communist Party through the Radicals, to frighten the petty-bourgeois with fairy tales about the Communist Party being a party of war, to put an end to the Popular Front, and then to throw the Radicals on to the muck heap like a sucked lemon and give the fascist scoundrels a clear thoroughfare to power.
In Britain the reactionaries want to establish the Tories firmly in power for many years to come as "saviours of peace," to squash the Popular Front movement with the help of the Labour leaders, and to demoralize and enfeeble the British working class; in the United States they want to help the Fords, Morgans and Hearsts to smash the democratic movement.
The reactionaries would like to destroy the labour movement and settle accounts with the country of socialism.
What do the working people want? They want at all costs to help the Spanish people to establish in their own country a system that suits them, to organize international defence of the Spanish people, and to develop such a movement all over the world as will make the reactionaries think twice before strangling the free Spanish people.
In the Far East they want to prevent the partition of China, to help the Chinese people drive the Japanese invaders out of their country; to force the bourgeois governments by a mass movement to withdraw their support from the Japanese militarists and supply China with all she needs for victory over the enemy.
In France the workers want to win back to the Popular Front the vacillating section of the peasantry and small townsfolk, who are becoming more and more convinced that the Munich policy will end by making the French people a vassal of German fascism; they want not only to preserve the Popular Front but to widen it by drawing in those sections which do not wish either themselves to 93 follow the fatal path of capitulation to the fascist aggressors or to lead others along it.
In Britain the workers want to fight to a finish the struggle which has already begun for the formation of a Popular Front, and thus to deal a crushing blow not only to British but to world reaction; at the same time, in the course of the fight for the Popular Front, they want to brush aside the pro-fascist elements among the British bourgeoisie and to support those who favour resisting the fascist aggressors.
In the United States the working people want to strengthen and extend the democratic movement in order to prevent the reactionary, pro-fascist elements from getting into power.
As to the countries under fascist dictatorship---Germany, Japan and Italy---the .working people of the whole world want the governments of these countries to be defeated in war; they want to help the people of these countries to enter the broad path of an open mass struggle against the fascist regime, a struggle that will lead to the overthrow of the fascist government, in which the international working class and all working people are vitally interested. They want to prevent world reaction from throwing a life belt to the fascist governments of Germany, Italy and Japan, which are heading for the abyss of financial bankruptcy. They do not want world reaction to present the fascist governments with sources of food, raw materials, ore, oil, etc., for the development of new wars of plunder. They want to prevent easy ``victories'' for the fascist robbers, who attack weak nations, but stand in dread of serious resistance.
They demand the organization of resistance by the international working class, by the anti-fascist forces of the world, to fascist expansion, to the economic and political enthralment of nations as a prelude to their military enslavement. They want to help the struggle against German fascism, the struggle of the enslaved people of Austria, of the enthralled peoples of Czechoslovakia and Hungary, and of the peoples of Rumania and Yugoslavia, who are under threat of enslavement. They want to support the enslaved people of Abyssinia against Italian fascism. They are fighting for the formation of a front of nations, a front of international resistance to the bloc of fascist aggressors.
The working people want a united front of the international working class, so as to put an end to the capitulatory policy of the reactionary Social-Democratic leaders. Such a front would lead the labour movement out of its state of dismay and disorganization on 94 to the road of victorious battles against fascism. It would increase the confidence of millions of proletarians in their own strength, and it would infect wide sections of the working people, the peasantry and the small townsfolk with this confidence. It would increase the strength of resistance of the masses to fascist aggression in all countries, and it would rouse the peoples of Germany, Italy and Japan to overthrow the fascist dictatorship. The establishment of a united international working-class front would be a most severe defeat for* fascism.
The working people want a united front of the working class of the capitalist countries with the Soviet working class, with the armed Soviet people, who possess a powerful state and the material power of victorious socialism. This front would be the real guarantee of peace. World reaction would dash itself to pieces against the impregnable rock of such a front.
The working people of the capitalist countries, reduced to despair by crises, unemployment, poverty, fascist terror and imperialist wars, but stirred into movement by the immense'socialist victories of the Soviet people, want to live without fascism, without capitalism. They want socialism. That is the reason for the fury of the moribund capitalist world. It wants to save itself by fascism. But fascism will not save capitalism from destruction, for fascism only drives the discontent of the masses deeper underground and paves the way for an explosion of enormous destructive power. Fascism will not be saved by imperialist wars, for its imperialist wars give rise to revolutions. Capitalism will not be saved by a new redivision of the world, for new redivisions of the world merely deepen the capitalist chaos.
The moribund capitalist world will not save itself by a counterrevolutionary war on the Soviet Union, but will only hasten its own destruction. The armed resistance of the great Soviet people will stir up the whole world of labour, all those whose right to liberty, work, a better life, and an independent country has been trampled underfoot by fascism. It will rouse proletarians and working people in all corners of the globe, who will realize that the hour of retribution for their centuries of suffering is at hand. It will let loose throughout the world a mighty movement of anti-fascist forces, heartened by the tremendous power of resistance offered by the Soviet people to fascism. It will spur on to struggle peoples who have hitherto avoided coming to grips with fascism, It will turn against fascism the peoples of the fascist states, who will have arms placed in their hands. For the fascist governments it will be a war not only against the Soviet 95 Union, but also against their own peoples. For the Soviet people, for the working people of the world, for all advanced and progressive mankind, it will be the most just and sacred war ever waged in the history of humanity, a war which "will most certainly loosen a number of revolutionary knots in the rear of the enemy, disintegrating and demoralizing the ranks of imperialism." (Stalin.)
96 __ALPHA_LVL2__ TWENTY YEARS ALONG THE PATH OFComrades, the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.) is meeting twenty years after the foundation of the Comintern.
"The historic significance of the Third, Communist International," Lenin wrote, "lies in the fact that it has begun to give effect to Marx's great slogan summing up a century of development of socialism and the working-class movement, the slogan which is expressed in the concept: dictatorship of the proletariat." (V. I. Lenin, Collected Works, Russ. ed., Vol. XXIV, p. 248.)
The Communist International was following the path of Lenin and Stalin when it united the proletarian vanguard that had been raised from the midst of the working class of all countries by the victory of the Great Socialist Revolution. The formation of the Communist International answered to the fundamental interests and the historic aims of the world labour movement, which had been split by the policy of class collaboration with the bourgeoisie pursued by the Social-Democratic Parties and by their open betrayal of the interests of proletarian revolution during the first imperialist world war.
The Communist International was following the path of Lenin and Stalin when, in 1918-23, it made every .effort to guide the movement of the revolutionary masses in Central Europe to the overthrow of capitalism. It was following this path when it fought the ``reforms'' and bourgeois democracy with which the bourgeoisie hoped to save itself from the onslaught of the revolutionary masses and block the road to proletarian revolution.
The Comintern was following the path of Lenin and Stalin when, during the period of partial and relative stabilization of capitalism, it concentrated its fire on the Social-Democratic Parties, which by their policy were helping the bourgeois reaction to consolidate itself and assume the offensive against the working people.
__PRINTERS_P_97_COMMENT__ 7---263 97The Comintern was following this path when it purged its ranks of the fellow-travelers whom the revolutionary wave of 1918-23 h§d washed like jetsam to the Communist shore, *when it ruthlessly cauterized the opportunist infection, the hangovers of the ideology of Social-Democracy, Centrism and anarcho-syndicalism. It was following this path when it adopted the course of Bolshevization of its Sections, waged a struggle on two fronts, stamped out unprincipled factionalism and followed the aim of hammering out monolithic Communist Parties in battle.
It was the path of Lenin and Stalin that the Communist International was following in the world economic crisis, when, in the face of the fascist offensive and incipient imperialist wars, it called upon the masses to form a united working-class front and an antifascist Popular Front against fascism and imperialist war. Thereby the Communist International answered the aspirations of millions of working people who wished to tighten their ranks and to unite for a combined effort to escape from the torments of fascist terror, from the bloody inferno of predatory wars, from the atrocities of the decaying capitalist system.
The path traversed by the Communist International in these twenty years, the path of struggle for socialist revolution, for the dictatorship of the proletariat, has been no easy one. It has been attended not only by victories but by tremendous difficulties and temporary defeats.
``. .. Revolution," said Comrade Stalin, "does not usually develop along a straight ascending line, as a continuous rise, but in zigzags, in advances and retreats, in an ebb and flow, hardening the forces of the revolution in the course of development and preparing the way for its final victory." (3. Stalin, "Results of the Work of the Fourteenth Conference of the Russian Communist Party.")
During these twenty years the world bourgeoisie has spared no efforts to wipe the Communist movement from the face of the earth. It has sent Communists to prison, tortured them, murdered them. It has driven them out of the factories, deprived them of a livelihood, organized brutal attacks on them. It has set fire to Reichstags, fabricated ``Comintern'' documents, concluded international police conventions. The henchmen of the bourgeoisie, the reactionary leaders of Social-Democracy and the reformist trade unions, have crusaded against the Communists time without number.
98The rabid enemies of the working class who have become agents of the fascist espionage services have attempted to divert the Communist movement from the Bolshevik path, to disintegrate and destroy it. Comrade Stalin has helped the international Communist movement to expose and thwart the counter-revolutionary designs of the agents of the class enemy. Under his leadership the C.P.S.U. (B.) has utterly routed them, has brushed the despicable fascist insects from the victorious path of the builders of a classless, socialist society, and has thereby strengthened the position of world communism.
Comrade Stalin has not only protected the great doctrine of MarxEngels-Lenin from distortion by enemy elements, but has developed it further and applied it to the new conditions of the era of the general crisis of capitalism and the victory of socialism in the Soviet Union. He has armed the international proletariat with this doctrine, widened its horizons, made the prospects of its struggle more definite and imbued the workers of all countries with still greater confidence in victory.
Under the leadership of Comrade Stalin the peoples of the Soviet Union have erected a mighty socialist fortress, strengthening it by their socialist victories with every passing day; and in doing so they have ceaselessly strengthened the positions of the international proletariat and the working people of the whole world.
The hopes of the world bourgeoisie have been shattered.
They have been shattered because communism cannot be destroyed, just as the vehicle of communism, the working class, cannot be destroyed. They have been shattered because communism is the concentrated expression of the fundamental interests of the working class and of the ultimate aims of its movement, aims which correspond to the interests of all the working people. They have been shattered because the idea of communism, is no longer an abstract dream of the finest minds of humanity; this idea now has its material embodiment in the Soviet Union, which shows the international working class and all working people the true road to their emancipation.
The hopes of the world bourgeoisie have been shattered because the great Stalinist work of building socialism in the U.S.S.R. has served to strengthen and consolidate the international proletarian ties of the working class of the U.S.S.R. with the working class of the bourgeois countries. They have been shattered because the mighty land of socialism gains strength with every day and with every hour, and because the Communist Parties light their path of progress with __PRINTERS_P_99_COMMENT__ 7* 99 __ALPHA_LVL0__ The End. [END] ~ Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1939/LSTT487/20100304/199.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2010.03.06) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [*]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ the torch of the immortal doctrine of Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin. (Stormy applause.)
The hopes of the world bourgeoisie have been shattered, and will be shattered, because the interests of the working people of the whole world are guarded by the genius of labouring humanity, Comrade Stalin.
(Stormy applause and cheers. All rise. Cries of "Long live the great leader of world communism, Comrade Stalin!")
[100]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
V. MOLOTOV
Comrades, the Third Five-Year Plan for the national-economic development of the U.S.S.R. has been submitted to you for consideration. It is a gigantic program of expansion in the national economy, of progress in culture and of advance in the well-being of the people. This program has its foundation in our victory, the victory of the working people of the Soviet Union, in having carried to completion the First and Second Five-Year'Plans.
The Third Five-Year Plan accords with the new period which we have inaugurated. It accords with the fact that the U.S.S.R. has already entered upon a new phase of development, the phase of the completion of the building of classless, socialist society and the gradual transition from socialism to communism. The Third Five-Year Plan will be one of the principal stages in accomplishing this great task, the task of passing on to complete communism. To undertake this matter means the taking on of complex and difficult tasks.
We are not dismayed by the difficulties of the impending struggle for the Third Five-Year Plan. We are fully confident of our ability to cope with these new tasks, also. In this we are fully warranted by the successes achieved in the fulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan.
That the Second Five-Year Plan has been a success is apparent to everyone. The chief historical task assigned by the Second FiveYear Plan has been accomplished: all exploiting classes have been completely abolished, and the causes giving rise to the exploitation of man by man and to the division of society into exploiters and exploited have been done away with for all time. All this is primarily the result of the abolition of the private ownership of the means of production. It is the result of the triumph in our country of state and of cooperative and collective-farm property, that is, socialist property. Exceptions to this rule constitute but an insignificant fraction, and even these exceptions will soon disappear. In the cities, socialist economy and the working class, which embraces workers and employees., 102 have exercised full dominion for quite some years now. The formerly backward countryside has undergone a transformation. The collectivefarm system has strengthened and become a powerful force for communism. Socialism, the first phase of communism, has in the main already been built in our country. The historic achievement of a socialist society and a socialist state has received the force of law in the great Stalin Constitution.
All this denotes that our society now consists of two classes friendly to each other, of workers and peasants united in a common cause, the cause of building communism. This great cause brings the workers and peasants of the U.S.S.R. ever closer together, unites them ever more firmly in comradeship and amity as active and conscious builders of communist society. The line of demarcation between the two classes of the working people of the U.S.S.R. is becoming obliterated more and more, as is also the line between these classes and the intelligentsia, which is engaged in mental labour for the benefit of Soviet society.
Just see for yourselves what has taken place in our country.
In 1928 the picture was as follows:
Social Composition of the Population of the U.S.S.R.
in 1928
(In per cent of total)
1. Workers and employees.......... 17
2. Collective farmers and handicraftsmen
organized in producers' cooperatives...... 3
3. Individual peasants, and handicraftsmen not
organized in producers' cooperatives ... 73
4. Capitalist elements (private traders and
kulaks) ................. 5
5. Miscellaneous (students, the armed forces,
pensioners, etc.)............. 2
Total..... 100
That is how matters stood in the U.S.S.R. when the work of laying the foundation of socialist society in our country was begun.
Thus, if we take that portion of the population which is wholly bound up with socialist economy, that is, if we take the workers, employees, collective farmers and the entire group classified as miscellaneous, we find that ten years ago this portion of the population represented in the aggregate 22 per cent, or less than one-fourth, of the total population of the U.S.S.R. Three-fourths of the population at that time were still tied to private enterprise; and approximately 5 per cent of them---private traders and kulaks---were to be classified as exploiters.
103Today our country presents an entirely different picture. It is with good reason that we speak of the achievements of the First and Second Five-Year Plans. The social composition of our society has radically changed.
Here are some data on the social composition of the population of the U.S.S.R. in 1937.
Social Composition of the Population of the U.S.S.R.
in 1937
(In per cent of total)
1. Workers and employees.......... 35
2. Collective farmers and handicraftsmen
organized in producers' cooperatives..... 55
3. Individual peasants, and handicraftsmen not
organized in producers' cooperatives .... 6
4. Miscellaneous (students, the armed forces,
pensioners, etc.)............. 4
Total..... 100
This is what the U.S.S.R., our socialist society, looks like today.
It appears from the above that at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period, 94 per cent of the population was composed of workers, employees, and peasants engaged in socialist, that is, in state and in cooperative and collective-farm economy. Individual peasants and handicraftsmen not organized in producers' cooperatives accounted for about 6 per cent. The exploiting elements were abolished; they vanished from our land^^1^^.
The transformation that has been going on in orur society during the last decade found most striking expression in the conversion of the former peasantry into a collective-farm peasantry, and in the great relative increase of the working 'class in 'the U.S.S.R. Whereas in 1928 workers and employees constituted only 17 per cent of the population, by 1937 the percentage had risen to 35. The proportion of workers and employees had doubled. The further growth of cities and of industry entails a further proportionate growth of the working class, with a corresponding proportionate diminution of the peasantry.
What accounts for this transformation of our society, and for the complete abolition of exploiting classes and groups in the U.S.S.R. which we have achieved?
First, our successful fulfilment of the principal and decisive economic task of the .Second Five-Year Plan, the task of completing the technical reconstruction of the national economy, whereby we 104 established the material and technical base for the collective-farm system in the countryside.
Second, the fact that we have done everything possible to enhance the well-being of the working people and to raise their cultural standard.
The following facts may be adduced to show the successful completion of the technical reconstruction of the national economy:
During the Second Five-Year Plan period the technical apparatus of production in industry and agriculture was radically renewed. In 1937 more than 80 per cent of the entire industrial output was yielded by new establishments built or completely reconstructed during the years of the First and Second Five-Year Plans. About 90 per cent of the tractors and harvester combines in use in agriculture are of Soviet manufacture, and were produced during the years of the Second Five-Year Plan. Instead of the somewhat over twofold increase in the output of the machine-building and metal-working industries contemplated under the Second Five-Year Plan, the increase was almost threefold. More than 50 per cent of the total number of machine tools, as of January 1, 1938, were produced during the Second Five-Year Plan period. The electric power available per worker in industry as a whole rose from 2,100 kwh. to 4,370 kwh. The task of mechanizing such laborious and difficult industrial processes as coal cutting and oil and peat extraction, as well as the mechanization of fishing, etc., has been accomplished in the main.
According to the Second Five-Year Plan, industrial production was to have increased from 43,000,000,000 rubles to 93,000,000,000 rubles, but the actual output of industry in 1937 amounted to 96,000,000,000 rubles.
The Second Five-Year Plan provided for a Ilk per cent increase in the output of our industry, but the actual increase in output was 121 per cent. On April 1, 1937, that is, within four years and three months, industry had already reached the level specified for the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period. Thus in industry the Second Five-Year Plan was carried out ahead of time.
In the Second Five-Year Plan the average annual rate of increase was fixed at 16.5 per cent, but the actual rate achieved was 17.1 per cent. Thus, the rates of increase of industrial output were higher than specified.
It goes without saying that not all branches of industry worked with equal success.
We scored our greatest successes in heavy industry, in the 105 production of means of production. Here output increased almost two and a half times (by 140 per cent) and the plan was considerably exceeded: this line of production recorded a 122 per cent fulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan. Still, in several important branches of heavy industry, such as the production of pig iron, coal and oil, there was a considerable deficiency in plan fulfilment.
In the manufacture of 'articles of consumption, though output was doubled (an even 100 per cent increase), the plan was not quite fulfilled. Because of the unsatisfactory work of light industry, plan fulfilment was only 85 per cent for consumers' goods, while the food industry under the People's Commissariat of the Food Industry of the U.S.S.R. fulfilled its plan 113 per cent, which was considerably in excess of specifications.
It must be stated that also during the Second Five-Year Plan period the growth of heavy industry was considerably more rapid than that of industry manufacturing consumers' goods. This was mainly due to the circumstance that in the course of fulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan it became necessary for us to introduce major corrections into the plan for the development of industry. As was the case under the First Five-Year Plan, the international situation compelled us to increase the rates of development that had been laid down for the defence industry, and, as you are aware from Comrade Voroshilov's speech at the Congress, not little has been done in this regard. (Applause.) This made it imperative to accelerate considerably the expansion of heavy industry, at the cost of reducing, to a certain extent, the rates of growth of light industry. But in return we have compelled the most aggressive imperialists to be more restrained toward the U.S.S.R. (Applause.) It must be admitted, however, that now attention to the further intensive development of heavy industry must be accompanied by a considerable stimulation of the whole range of industries producing articles of general consumption.
In agriculture gross output has increased 54 per cent, or one and a half times, during the Second Five-Year Plan period. Grain growing in our country has coped successfully with the well-known task assigned by Comrade Stalin, having yielded a harvest in 1937 of more than 7,000,000,000 poods of grain. Final figures put the 1937 grain harvest at 7,340,000,000 poods, which is an overfulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan assignment. The amount of cotton picked was also in excess of plan: it rose from 78,000,000 poods to 157,000,000 poods, a twofold increase. The sugar beet crop increased from 66,000,000 centners, an admittedly very low level, to 219,000,000 centners, or more than threefold. Flax, Indian corn and sunflower 106 seed lagged very considerably behind. Livestock products increased 54 per cent, or more than one and a half times.
Great successes have been achieved in the mechanization of agriculture. The supply of tractors and harvester combines planned for agriculture has been exceeded. In technical level and large-scale production capacity, our agriculture is now ahead of any other country in the world. Cotton, flax and Indian corn picking is, however, still behind with regard to mechanization.
The state farms have achieved considerable successes, having exceeded the plan set for grain deliveries. It still remains for the future, however, to make the state farms highly remunerative.
The expansion of the national economy was largely due to the successful work of the transport systems, particularly the railroads, which fulfilled and overfulfilled their five-year traffic plan in four years. Water-borne transport is far behind. Transportation by motor car and aircraft has developed rapidly before our very eyes.
All these economic successes indicate that the technical reconstruction of the national economy was steadily being carried out. But this does not mean that we may rest content with the level that has been achieved. Quite the contrary. The tasks before us relating to the further technical equipment of industry and the whole of the national economy have become not smaller but greater.
The Second Five-Year Plan for improving the material conditions and raising the cultural standard of the working people, with an attendant rise of 100 per cent and over in the level of popular consumption, has likewise been fulfilled.
This is borne out in the first place by the fact that the production of consumers' goods doubled in the course of these years. In a number of very important branches of industry output not only doubled but considerably more than doubled, as, for instance, in the production of sugar, butter, sausage, knit goods and footwear.
While there was an 18 per cent increase in the number of workers and employees, the national payroll showed a 2 ^-fold increase, or a rise of 151 per cent, as against 55 per cent specified in the Second FiveYear Plan. Real wages of workers doubled during the Second FiveYear Plan (a 101 per cent increase).
State expenditures on cultural and other public services for workers and employees, that is, on education and public health, increased from 4,300,000,000 to 14,000,000,000 rubles, that is to say, more than threefold.
The prosperity of the collective farmers grew considerably during the Second Five-Year Plan period. This is apparent from the rising 107 incomes of the collective farms and their members. Thus, cash incomes of collective farms during the years of the Second Five-Year Plan rose from 4,600,000,000 rubles to 14,200,000,000 rubles, that is, more than trebled. The average amount of money paid out per collective-farm household increased during this period three and a half times. Cash incomes distributed among collective farmers according to work-day-units showed a 330 per cent increase, the rise having been particularly great in industrial crop districts.
The increase from 1,000,000,000 rubles to 4,500,000,000 rubles in savings bank deposits is indicative of the growing prosperity of the population..
The following facts attest to the cultural growth of the population: The number of children attending primary and secondary schools increased from 21,300,000 to 29,400,000. The secondary schools grew particularly rapidly, there having been a twofold increase in attendance in the fifth, sixth and seventh grades and a fifteen-fold increase in the eighth, ninth and tenth grades. The number of university and college students reached a total of 550,000. The student body in our institutions of higher learning is greater than the combined total of Germany, England, France, Italy and Japan. The vast development of our political and educational work is indicated by the considerable growth of book and newspaper publication, the increasing number of libraries and moving-picture theatres, particularly those equipped for sound films. Our libraries contain 75 books for every 100 inhabitants of the Soviet Union, which is over three times as many as Germany had in 1934. In the republics of Kirghizia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, that is, among the peoples of the Soviet East, the rates of increase in cultural development were greatest.
Considerable successes have also been achieved in the sphere of public health. Suffice it to say that the number of hospital beds was increased one and a half times during the years of the Second FiveYear Pl.an.
A total of 26,800,000 sq. metres of new housing space was thrown open to occupancy. It must be admitted that in this regard the Second Five-Year Plan was short of fulfilment by a considerable margin.
In trade the results achieved during the Second Five-Year Plan period were not small either. It need merely be stated that during 1935 the rationing system was abolished and the restricted sale, first of bread and then of all other foodstuffs and manufactured goods, was done away with. This we could achieve solely because of the. rapid 108 growth of industrial output and the considerable progress made in agriculture. The volume of trade in state and cooperative stores increased from 40,000,000,000 rubles to 126,000,000,000 rubles. In consequence of this prices on the collective-farm markets dropped considerably. However, we did not succeed in fulfilling the task set by the Second Five-Year Plan with regard to reducing retail prices of consumers' goods. But it is well known that the failure to make good in this respect was more than compensated by wage increases to workers and employees considerably in excess of the amounts provided for by the Five-Year Plan, as well as by the rapid increase in cash incomes of collective farms and their members.
In order to be able to correctly assess the scope of the work accomplished by the Soviet people during the years of the Second FiveYear Plan, let us compare the results of the Second Five-Year Plan with those of the First Five-Year Plan.
We have every right to be proud of our first great victory in the economic life and the socialist transformation of our country---the fulfilment of the First Five-Year Plan. The echo of this victory reverberated throughout the world. It was an historic event of international significance.
But in many respects the Second Five-Year Plan stood on a higher plane than the First Five-Year Plan.
Take, for instance, the following facts:
First, during the .Second Five-Year Plan period, the national income more than doubled, or, to be exact, increased 110 per cent. This enormous rise in the national income may be taken as a general summary of the economic successes achieved under the Second Five-Year Plan.
Second, during the First Five-Year Plan period 39,000,000,000 rubles' worth of new and reconstructed plant was put into operation, while during the Second Five-Year Plan period the corresponding figure was 103,000,000,000 rubles, a 160 per cent increase as against the First Five-Year Plan. This testifies to the fact that during the years of the Second Five-Year Plan conditions have been created in the Soviet Union which will make possible a further and much more powerful expansion of the national economy.
The successes achieved under the Second Five-Year Plan did not come to us of themselves. We won them in stubborn battle, overcoming considerable difficulties.
Remnants of the exploiting classes stood in our way. They clung desperately to their positions, but were completely swept away. 109 However, after smashing the class enemy within the country, we did not dismiss the question of combating our class enemies.
As long as the Soviet Union is surrounded by a capitalist world, we cannot be discharged of the duty to contend with this encirclement, to fight against its constantly renewed attacks upon the Soviet power, upon the U.S..S.R, The intensified struggle against wrecking and es: pionage, which occupied a great deal of our attention during the last few years, speaks for itself. In this struggle capitalism, and particularly its fascist forces, made use of every means of struggle against the U.S.S.R., even the most despicable and foul. They stopped at nothing, and utilized for their purposes all those Trotskyite-- BukhariniteYagodaite-Rykovite degenerates and their allies among the bourgeois nationalists. But it was beyond their power to stop the growth of the U.S.S/.R. or even to retard its progress. We have learnt a new lesson in the class struggle, in the struggle against the capitalist encirclement, and, in particular, against the fascist forces of capitalism. Apparently, we shall be able to make use of this lesson for the purpose of intensifying in many respects our struggle against all enemies of the Soviet power, and to this end shall strengthen our state in every way.
Though we have purged the U.S.S.R. of hostile classes, of exploiters, we have not yet abolished classes altogether. There remain the working class and the peasantry. But they are no longer the former working class nor are they the former peasantry. Their role in society and in the state has changed. Their mode of life, their culture and morals have changed in many respects.
Having eliminated the remnants of the exploiting classes, we have established a society of two .mutually friendly classes, the working class and the peasantry. This society has given rise to an intelligentsia of its own, which is no longer bourgeois or bourgeois-democratic, but is, in the main, a socialist intelligentsia. This intelligentsia, linked with ties of blood to the working people and to socialism, plays a great part in the work of directing the development and consolidation of the new society and state. The antagonism that used to exist between town and country has largely been uprooted, but a substantial difference between the above two classes still exists. This difference exists, primarily, because the workers are employed in establishments which are the possession of the whole people, are socialist-state in character, while the peasants work on the collective farms, which are socialistcooperative in character. Both of these classes, the working class and the collective-farm peasantry, are already classes of socialist society. And while the working class, as the more advanced class and the one better trained for the establishment of complete communism, has 110 retained its leading role, the peasantry in its turn does not maintain an attitude of passivity, but takes an active part in the building of the new society, in the building of communism. This principle is embodied in the new Constitution of the U.S.S.R., an instrument of the utmost importance, which is inseparably linked up with the name of Comrade Stalin. (Loud and prolonged applause.)
Does this mean that all workers and all peasants have become advanced members of our society? No, it does not mean this yet.
Even among the workers, some are advanced while others are backward, not to speak of degenerates. It is the same among the peasants: some are advanced and others are backward. Some, of course, are worse than simply backward. The advanced people of our day are the active and devoted builders of communism, the best champions in the struggle for the consolidation of our state. These advanced people of our society are already consciously followed by the overwhelming majority of workers and peasants. But even among workers, not to mention employees, petty-bourgeois habits are still very much alive. There are still quite a few left who are ready to grab from the state as much as they can, without caring a rap for the consequences. It is therefore necessary to fight for the interests of the state and for the strengthening of labour discipline in our offices and factories, to fight against loafers, good-for-nothings and those who flit from job to job. There are also quite a few among the peasantry who take no interest in the weal of the state or even of their own collective farm, who think only of stuffing their own pockets with money and goods at the expense of the state and the collective farln. Here, too, energetic steps must be taken to improve discipline and educational work. If such steps are not taken and intensive work is not carried on to bring uj> the working people in the spirit of consolidating socialist property and the state, it will be impossible to change backward people into conscious and active builders of communism.
Our strength lies in the fact that in the Soviet Union it is the most advanced of the people who set the mark. Who are these foremost people? They are politically conscious Communists, non-Party Bolsheviks, Stakhanovites, those in the lead on the collective farms and members of the socialist intelligentsia. These are the people who are fashioning the new life. Their number and social importance is growing with every day.
One of the most outstanding phenomena of recent times has been the .Stakhanov movement, a new form of socialist competition that has developed among us. From the ranks of the working class have come people who, by dint of exemplary work in mastering the 111 technique of production, rapidly occupied foremost, leading posts in their respective industries. By their high labour productivity based on improved organization, these Stakhanovites have pointed the road" to new successes in industry. A counterpart of this movement is steadily gaining ground in the collective farms. The glorious deeds of Stakhanovite workers are being matched by the foremost among the collective farmers, and more and more of the working people are following their lead. There has never been anything like the Stakhanov movement under capitalism, nor can there be.
The Stakhanov movement is one of the most magnificent results of the Second Five-Year Plan. It is evidence of the growth of our forces, of the growth of their communist consciousness, a guarantee that the U.S.S.R. will achieve new and still more glorious successes.
Such are the results of the Stalinist Second Five-Year Plan.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ II. THE CHIEF ECONOMIC TASK OF THE U.S.S.R.You know, comrades, that achievements have their seamy side, too. They sometimes evoke uncalled-for presumption. It cannot be denied that in some cases we are still uncritical and have a tendency to overrate our achievements. Therefore, we must analyse the facts as they are and see what they amount to.
We have indeed overtaken and surpassed the capitalist countries in the rates of industrial development. We have indeed overtaken and surpassed these countries in the technical side of production, as well. Both these achievements are of great consequence, but that is not all that is required. Comrade Stalin warned us long ago, at the Sixteenth Congress of the Party in 1930, that "we must not confuse rates, of development of industry with (the level of its development," that these are two totally different things; that "we are outrageously behind the foremost capitalist countries in our level of industrial development"; that we must have high rates of industrial development in order to "overtake and outstrip.the advanced capitalist countries technically and economically.''
Nevertheless, in some quarters people have begun to forget that we are still behind some capitalist countries economically, that is, in industrial output ,per head of the population. They have begun to forget that, strictly speaking, it is only a mere ten or twelve years since we were able to begin the task of lifting our country out of its previous underdevelopment. They have began to forget that the lag which we must make good in order to catch ;up with the other countries is the 112 i'esult of more than a century of backwardness in ftussia before the revolution. We must be sure not to forget this, and cannot possibly rest content with what we have achieved.
In the U.S.S.R. socialism has been built, but only in the main. We have still a lot of work, a tremendous amount of work to do before we can really provide the U.S.S.R. with all it needs; before we have &n adequate output of all commodities, an abundance of all products; before our country is developed to such an extent, both technically and economically, that we shall not only not yield precedence to the most advanced capitalist country but tower far above it.
We have entered a new period of development, the period of gradual transition from socialism to communism. But this transition to communism implies an abundance of all commodities from which we are still far removed. This transition to communism implies so high a level of technical and economic development in our country as will exceed by far the present level of any capitalist country, even the economically most developed. Hence, we are faced with new problems, problems of enormous importance in the economic development of the U.S.S.R.
These tasks arise, first of all, from the fact that in respect of economic development, that is, per capita output of industry, we are still behind the most highly developed capitalist countries. Nor must we lose sight of the fact that the population of the U.S.S.R. is much 'greater than that of the U.S.A., is more than twice that of Germany, and is approximately four times the population of either England or France.
I shall supplement my theses with a few figures. Here is the table in point:
Per Capita Output of Some of the Principal Products of Industry
in the U.S.S.R. and the Capitalist Countries
(U.S.S.R.---1937; other countries---latest figures published)
PH
a
a
®
43 ^
o
Branch of Industry
Unit
g
|.-a
§
P
P
O
C5M
^
^
Electric power .....
kilowatt-
215 1,160
735 608 490 421
hours
kilograms
Steel .........
105 397 291 279 188 62Coal ..........
757 3,429
3,313
5,165
1,065
These figures show that computed in terms of per capita output, we are well behind in the production of electric power, pig iron, steel, coal and cement. Yet, unless these industries are highly developed we cannot ensure maximum expansion for the machinebuilding and the defence industries, for transportation and the . construction of new mills and factories. These figures further show that we still have much to do in the development of heavy industry, although we have been paying great attention to it all these years. Incidentally, it must be mentioned that there are major branches of heavy industry, like the oil industry, in which the U.S.S.R., while very much behind the U.S.A., is far in advance of Germany, France, Italy and Japan, where practically no oil is extracted.
Let us now turn to the question of the level of industry producing articles for mass consumption. There, too, as we shall see, the U.S.S.R. is behind in the per capita output of manufactures like cotton and woolen fabrics, leather footwear, sugar, paper, soap and some others.
Here is another table:
Per Capita Output of Some of the Principal Products of Industry
in the U.S.S.R. and the Capitalist Countries
(U.S.S.R.---1937; other countries---latest figures published)
Product
Unit
_a
8 oa
02'
CD
CD .13
f* FH
a
cS
P
^
o
OH
PK
!-»
.Cotton fabrics . .
sq. metres
no data
60 31 57 Woolen fabrics
metres
0.6
2.8
no data
7.4
no data
no data
Leather footwear .
pairs
2.6
1.1
2.2
no data
no data
kilograms
Sugar ......
14 12 29 8 21 17Soap ......
3 12 7 11 1.0
no data ~
How is it that in spite of all we have done, and in spite of the tremendous rate at which our industries have grown, we are still behind the most highly developed capitalist countries economically?
The reply to this question is clear. Because not so long ago our country was terribly backward industrially, and, considering the size of the population, had an exceedingly low per capita industrial output.
114In the short time which has elapsed since then it could not make up for the time previously lost.
Remember what Lenin wrote as long ago as 1913 in the Pravda of that day, in an. article entitled "How to Increase the Per Capita Consumption in Russia?" Castigating the paid hacks of the bourgeois press, Lenin wrote:
``Russia is still an incredibly backward country, backward to an unheard-of degree, poor and semi-barbarian, which, in equipment of modern instruments of production, is four times worse off than England, five times worse off than Germany, and ten times worse off than America.''
In pointing this out Lenin made a scathing attack on the capitalists and landlords who were in power in Russia, because "by their oppression" they were "condemning five-sixths of the population to beggary and the whole country to stagnation and decay.''
Lenin kept returning to this question again and again. In the same year, 1913, in an article entitled "Iron in Peasant Farming," he compared Russia of that date with Hungary. He cited illuminating facts about the economics of Hungary, where the reins of government were held by reactionary landlords, as in Russia. Lenin at that time established the following fact: In 2,500,000 out of the 2,800,000 peasant farms in Hungary, "ploughs with wooden coulters and harrows with wooden frames undoubtedly prevail, while almost half of the farm Wagons have wheels with wooden hubs." And Lenin added: "The poverty, primitiveness and neglect of the overwhelming majority of our peasant farms is incomparably worse than in Hungary.''
Such was really the case.
What was the level of industry at that time in Russia?
The per capita output of electric power in 1913 was one-- seventeenth of the output in the .U.S.A. and one-fifth of the output in Germany.
The per capita output of pig iron in 1913 was one-eleventh of the output in the U.S.A., one-eighth of the output in Great Britain, oneeighth of the output in Germany and one-fourth of the output in France.
The per capita output of steel in 1913 Was one-eleventh of the out put in the U.S.A., one-eighth of the output in Germany, one-sixth of the output in Great Britain and one-fourth of the output in France.
The per capita output of coal and lignite (in terms of coal) in our country in 1913 was one twenty-sixth of the output in the U.S.A., __PRINTERS_P_115_COMMENT__ 8* 115 one thirty-first of the output in Great Britain, one-fifteenth of the output in Germany and one-fifth of the output in France.
That is how low the level of Russian industry was before the revolution. The landlords and capitalists who ruled the country used the iron hand of tsarism to shackle the mighty forces of our people and gave them no opportunity to-develop.
Especially noteworthy is the fact that Russia at that time, far from overtaking the most highly developed capitalist countries, was, on the contrary, falling further and further behind them in a number of major industries.
Here are the figures for the production of pig iron in 1900 and 1913.
The per capita production of pig iron in tsarist Russia was oneeighth of the output in the U.S.A. in 1900, while in 1913 it had receded to only one-eleventh of that country's output. In comparison with Germany, the output of pig iron in Russia was approximately onesixth in 1900, while in 1913 it had receded to one-eighth. In comparison with France it was one-third in 1900, while in 1913 it had receded to one-fourth.
The same applies to steel.
We can understand with what alarm and indignation Lenin, in the first of the articles I mentioned, wrote about the "increasing backwardness" of Russia, about the fact that "we are falling further and further behind.''
That is why, just before the October Revolution, when Russia had been reduced to extremity by the imperialist war, Lenin put the question bluntly in an article entitled "The Impending Catastrophe and How To Combat It.''
``The war has created such an immense crisis, has so strained the material and moral forces of the people, has dealt such blowsat the modern social organization, that humanity finds itself faced by an alternative: either it perishes, or it entrusts its fate to the most revolutionary class for the swiftest and most radical transition to a superior method of production.
``Owing to a number of historical causes---the greater backwardness of Russia, the unusual hardships incurred by her because of the war, the utter rottenness of tsardom and the extreme tenacity of the traditions of 1905---the revolution broke out in Russia earlier than in other countries. The result of the revolution has been that the political system of Russia has in a few months caught up with that of the advanced countries.
116``But that is not enough. The war is inexorable, it puts the alternative with ruthless severity: either perish, or overtake and outstrip the advanced countries economically as well."
Lenin put the question squarely: "Either perish, or overtake and outstrip the advanced countries economically as well."
As you see, the task facing the Bolsheviks was no small one and no easy one; but the Bolsheviks were not to be frightened by difficulties. When the Bolshevik Party came into power, it set to work to solve this problem with the greatest enthusiasm. Much has already been done. Instead of lagging disgracefully behind the other countries, as Russia did before the revolution, the Soviet Union is steadily advancing from year to year, raising the level of development of its industry to the level of the most highly developed capitalist countries. The Bolshevik revolution saved Russia from her disgraceful backwardness as compared with other countries. It raised our industry to a high level. However, the problem has not yet been solved. We still have to admit that we are behind economically, but we do not intend to resign ourselves to this position and shall not do so.
The principal economic task of our country, of which Lenin spoke before the October Revolution, must now be faced squarely: the time has come to tackle in practice the main economic task of the U.S.S.R.: to overtake and surpass also economically the most highly developed capitalist countries of Europe and the United States of America, to solve this problem once and for all in the shortest possible time. This problem solved, we shall make the U.S.S.R. the most advanced country in the world in all respects: not only in respect to its political system ---that we achieved long ago; nol: only in respect to its technical level of production----that we have also achieved. By solving this problem we shall raise the U.S.S.R. to world primacy economically as well. Then and only then will the significance of the new era in the development of the U.S.S.R., the era of transition from socialist society to communist society, be really revealed.
What must we strive for in practice in order to overtake and surpass the major capitalist countries economically?
Comrade Stalin has already told us in his speech what is necessary in the output of pig iron, for instance. I shall repeat these figures.
In order to surpass Britain in the output of pig iron, we must increase the annual smelting to 25,000,000 tons. This, by the way, is not much more than the objective set by the Third Five-Year Plan, under which we must increase our output of pig iron to 22,000,000 tons by 1942. In order to surpass Germany in the output of pig iron, 117 we must increase the annual smelting of pig iron to 40,000,000- 45,000,000 tons. This, as you see, is a much bigger task. Before we can surpass the U.S.A. economically we must have an annual output of pig iron of 50,000,000-60,000,000 tons. As you see, this is a gigantic task, a task which is far beyond the bounds of the Third Five-Year Plan.
I shall cite another example---electric power.
In the per capita consumption of electric power at the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period, the U.S.S.R. will outstrip the present level of France, but will still have only two-thirds of Germany's consumption and slightly over one-third of the present consumption of electric power in the U.S.A.
Need I explain why precisely now is the time to face squarely the task of "overtaking and outstripping"? That is clear without lengthy explanations.
We have amassed a tremendous amount of machinery in our industry and we have every chance of continuing our technical development at a rapid rate. We already have a large number of trained forces who have mastered technique and are ready for new and greater efforts to build up the economic power of the U.S.S.R. Furthermore, socialist society already has irrevocably taken shape in our country, and this society does not intend to and never will resign itself to being economically less, developed than the capitalist countries, even though this is the result of the age-old historic backwardness of our country. That is why the Bolshevik Party must put the solution of this problem on the order of the day. At the same time we shall consider it our duty to utilize and apply extensively in bur country all that is best in modern engineering and the technology of production, and also in scientific methods of organizing work. For this purpose we must utilize the experience of other countries in all respects, utilize it in Bolshevik fashion. Everything that can help us to speed the solution of the chief economic task of the U.S.S.R. must be taken into account.
The point now is to spur the ambition to accelerate our rates of industrial development, especially in heavy industry, which, in the last analysis, determines the rise of the whole national economy. The point is to fire the Bolsheviks and all honest people in our country with the ambition to put an end to the inadequacy of the economic level of the U.S.S.R. in the shortest possible time. It is now a question of developing competition in the field of economy between the U.S.S.R. and the major capitalist countries. This question has been transferred to the international arena. All the stronger, therefore, must be our endeavour to solve this new problem creditably.
As Comrade Stalin said in his report, time is needed for the 118 solution of this problem. We need another ten or fifteen years at least, another two or three Five-Year Plan periods. The fulfilment of the Third Five-Year Plan must, in many respects, predetermine the solution of this problem. Then let the Third Five-Year Plan become our banner of victory in the arena of the international competition for economic primacy between the U.S.S.R. and the capitalist countries 1 (Applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ III. THE PLAN FOR THE FURTHER ADVANCEMENTThe Third Five-Year Plan is a continuation of the first two FiveYear Plans. It is based on the further development of the same Bolshevik general line. It consistently pursues the line of the further industrialization of the U.S.S.R., which underlay all our past economic achievements and guarantees new and still greater progress in our economic development.
The Third Five-Year Plan provides for a tremendous advance in all branches of the national economy. This advance is particularly great in our industry, first and foremost in our heavy industry and defence industry. It ensures further progress in all the economic districts of the national republics, without losing sight of our major tasks in the interests of the state as a whole. This plan coordinates the development of the separate sections of the national economy, in pursuance of the general line, and provides for the accumulation of the necessary economic stocks and reserves. With the present enormous dimensions to which Soviet economy has grown, we cannot work normally and continue our advance in accordance with planned schedules unless the various industrial enterprises and the railways have sufficient reserves, such as fuel, for instance. But we require not only working reserves. In addition we need national reserves of fuel, electric power, manufactures and foodstuffs, not to mention a commensurate development of the railways and other forms of transport. The necessity for such reserves requires no proof, particularly in the light of our duty to ensure the defence needs of the U.S.S.R.
In the pre-Congress discussion on the theses for the Third FiveYear Plan, quite a number of valuable suggestions and amendments were proposed. Part of these suggestions should be duly considered when we adopt the Third Five-Year Plan theses in their final form. 119 As regards the collective farms, there is an obvious need for certain additions to the theses. These I shall deal with later.
The Third Five-Year Plan must take special account of certain shortcomings in the fulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan. As an example I might refer to the state of affairs in the electric power industry.
As you know, the plan for the production of electric power in the Second Five-Year Plan period was very nearly fulfilled, that is, by 96 per cent, to be more exact; but, on the other hand, we are also aware that the plan of power station construction was only half fulfilled, by only 55 per cent. Hence, the increase in the output of electric power in the Second Five-Year Plan period was obtained at the cost of a somewhat excessive load on the existing electric power stations. This situation is obviously anomalous. It could only arise as a result of serious defects in the actual planning of our national economic development, for which a sufficient supply of electric power is of decisive importance.
Some people might say that in the present case it is not so much a question of defective planning as of shortcomings in the fulfilment of the plan, that is, of poor work in electric power construction and an inadequate output of electrical equipment. But such an argument would not hold water. Planning cannot be considered efficient if it takes no account of the course of plan fulfilment. Such swivel-chair planning, detached from the realities of life, is not worth much. Planning does not consist in piling up tables of figures, irrespective of how the plan is progressing. The tables themselves, of course, are indifferent to the fulfilment of our plans, but we who are conducting economic development according to plan cannot in the least afford to be indifferent.
We need plans in order to have a correct line for our economic activity. We need plans by branches and districts, by years and shorter periods, with the various constituent plans correctly coordinated with the corresponding time limits. Corrections must be introduced in the planned figures and time limits for individual industries and districts to bring them in accord with actual plan fulfilment. We need plans as a check-up on our economic activity. If a plan is not followed up by a control of its fulfilment, it becomes a scrap of paper, a mere nothing. This concerns all our economic organizations, all our economic work. If we seriously organize the checking up on fulfilment, we shall improve our economic work and our planning as well.
We did not pay enough attention to keeping a check on plan 120 fulfilment. This neglect was often utilized by our enemies for wrecking purposes. We must put an end to such a state of affairs, and then our plans will play an even greater part in the'economic life of the country. We already have a certain improvement in the sphere of planning, but the State Planning Commission and the People's Commissariats have still much work to do in this direction.
I shall now take up some points in the Third Five-Year Plan.
Under the Third Five-Year Plan the national income will increase (in 1926-27 prices) from 96,000,000,000 rubles to 174,000,000,000 rubles, that is, by 80' per cent. This, on the whole, corresponds to the rates of increase in the national income during the first two Five-Year Plans. The national income under the First Five-Year Plan increased also by 80 per cent; under the Second Five-Year Plan it increased 110 per cent. But in actual amounts the increase in the national income under the Third Five-Year Plan will be much greater than in previous years. In the First Five-Year Plan period, the increase in the national income was 20,500,000,000 rubles, in the Second Five-Year Plan period 50,500,000,000 rubles. Thus, during the two Five-Year Plan periods combined the national income of our country increased by 71,000,000,000 rubles. This, as you see, is not a small sum. But the increase in the national income under the Third Five-Year Plan is to total 78,000,000,000 rubles, that is, more than under the previous two Five-Year Plans put together.
I shall now deal with the various branches of our national economy.
The output of industry in the U.S.S.R. in 1942---the last year of the Third Five-Year Plan---is set at 180,000,000,000 rubles (in 1926-27 prices), as against 95,500,000,000 rubles in»1937, which represents an increase of 88 per cent. Thus, the increase in industrial output under the Third Five-Year Plan will be 84,500,000,000 rubles, which is much greater than the aggregate increase of output under the first two Five-Year Plans. When this plan is fulfilled, the volume of our industrial output will be approximately fifteen times as large as in pre-war times.
The average annual rate of increase of industrial output is set at 13.5 per cent, that is, at a somewhat smaller rate than during the Second Five-Year Plan period. It must, however, be borne in mind that by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period each per cent of growth of industrial output will equal 1,800,000,000 rubles, as against 121 the 950,000,POO rubles represented by each per cent of growth at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period.
The plan provides for an average annual increase of 11 per cent in the output of articles of general consumption, and of 15 per cent in the output of the means of production. As a result the output of articles of general consumption is to increase 70 per cent by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period, while the production of the means of production is J:o double, which will increase its share in the output of all industry from 58 per cent, at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period, to 62 per cent at the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period. As you see, the plan provides for large rates of increase in the industry producing articles of general consumption, and at the same time for an even faster rate of development in heavy industry.
Here are the principal specifications for the major branches of industry producing means of production:
Increase, in Output of Industry Producing Means o! Production
Classification
1942 in per cent of 1937
Production of means of production (in million rubles, in prices of 1926-27) .......
55,200
112,000
Of which:
1. Machine-building and. metal-working
industries (in million rubles) .........
27,500
62,000
Inclusive of:
a. Metal-cutting machine tools (in units) . b. Main-line locomotives (in conventional ``E'' and ``SU'' equivalents, in units) . c. Main-line freight cars (in two-axle equivalents, in units) .........
36,000
1,581
58,800
70,000
2,090
90,000
194
132
153
d. Automobiles (in units) ........
200,000
400,000
2. Electric power (in million kilowatt-hours) 3. Coal (in thousand tons) ....... . .
36,400
127,300
. 75,000
230,000
206
181
4. Oil with gas (in thousand tons) .....
30,500
54,000
5 Peat (in thousand tons) . ...... ...
23,800
49,000
6. Pig iron (in thousand tons) .......
14,500
22,000
7. Steel (in thousand tons) .........
17,700
28,000
8. Rolled steel, pipes and forgiiigs from ingots
(in thousand tons) .... ........
13,000
21,000
9 Chemicals (in million rubles) . • .
5,900
13,400
10. Cement (in thousand tons) ........
5,500
10,000
11. Merchant timber hauled (in thousand cu.
metres) .................
111,300
200,000
12. Saw-mill products (in thousand cu. metres)
28,800
45,000
I shall also indicate the principal specifications for industry producing articles of general consumption:
Increase in Output of Industry Producing Articles of
General Consumption
Classification
1942 in )er cent of 1937
Production of articles of consumption (in million
rubles, in prices of 1926-27) ........
40,300
68,000
Of which:
1. People's Commissariat of the Textile Industry
8,500
13,400
2. People's Commissariat of Light Industry . .
6,700
9,800
3. People's Commissariat of the Fish Industry
8001,400
1694. People's Commissariat of the Meat and Dairy
2,900
6,100
5. People's Commissariat of the Food Industry
9,100
15,000
6. People's Commissariat of Agricultural Stocks
1,900
2,800
7. Producers' cooperatives (in prices of 1932) .
13,200
26,400
Separate Items of Production
831,600
1,300,000
2. Cotton fabrics, including undyed (in thousand
3,442,400
4,900,000
3. Woolen fabrics (in thousand metres) ....
105,100
175,000
4. Leather footwear (in thousand pairs) ....
5. Granulated sugar (in tons) .........
164,200
2,421,000
235,000
3,500,000
143
144
6. Canned goods (in thousand conventional cans) .
873,000
1,800,000
Under the Third Five-Year Plan industries like machine-building, electric power generation, the production of chemicals, of special steels and of some other manufactures are to develop at a rate set above the average.
The main tasks of our industrial executives, in furtherance of the success of the Third Five-Year Plan, are as follows:
a) Machine-building, iron and steel, and non-ferrous metal industries. The task is to force the rate of development of machine-- building, and thereby make possible a further great increase in the technical equipment of industry itself, of the other branches of the national economy, and of the national defence. This forcing of the pace in machine-building will inevitably lead to a new and greater advance, first, in iron and steel production: pig iron, steel, rolled steel and special steels; second, in non-ferrous metal production: copper, 123 aluminum, zinc, lead, nickel, etc. On our success in the solution of this group of problems mainly depends the solution of the principal economic task of the U.S.S.R.* the task of overtaking and surpassing the most highly developed capitalist countries economically as well.
In connection with the task of further developing mechanical engineering, we must emphasize the extraordinary importance of questions of technical policy. Not any kind of machine-building industry will do. We must develop an up-to-date machine-building industry, fully on a par with the principal achievements in world engineering. For instance, we must not merely increase the output of machine tools, but must insist on a decided increase in the proportion of highefficiency lathes and special lathes, particularly of the automatic and semi-automatic types. This applies to all the other departments of machine-building. We must not let our machine-building industry fall behind modern technique, modern technical achievements, as will surely be the case if we become self-complacent or swell-headed in this regard. The policy on technique in Soviet machine-building must be fully abreast of engineering progress throughout the world.
b) Fuel and the power base of the U.S.S.R. The task is to advance at Bolshevik rates the fuel industry, which has fallen behind in recent years, especially coal and oil production, and quickly develop the construction of power stations and of electrical equipment. The expansion of the fuel and power base must not merely keep pace with the progress of industry and the national economy, but must run on in advance and create a sound basis for their further development. We must put an end to the present lag in the sinking of coal pits and the development of oil fields, and also in the cutting of peat and the quarrying of oil shales. Unless we have a decided and immediate improvement in the construction of power stations and in the development of coal and oil fields and of fuel bases in general in all the main economic districts of the country, we cannot solve the other great tasks which face us in the advancement of our national economy. Without such an improvement we shall not be able to provide a sound basis for the fulfilment of the Third Five-Year Plan.
In order to prevent the overloading of the transportation systems with tremendous shipments of fuel, we must ensure maximum rates of development for coal mining in the Moscow fields, in the Ural district, in the Far East and in Central Asia. The formation of a new oilproducing region, a "Second Baku," between the Volga and the Urals must be considered a task of prime importance and urgency to the state. We must put an end to our slow progress in the utilization of gases; we must make wide use of natural and industrial gases and 124 also develop the underground gasification of coal; we must strictly hold to moderate and medium scales in the construction of electric power, heat-and-power and hydro-electric power stations, encouraging to the utmost the construction of small hydro-electric stations.
c) The chemical industry. Our task here is to quicken the advance of our chemical industry and the introduction of chemical processes into the national economy, for which we have boundless opportunities and the best prospects. Here it will be particularly important to collect and properly allocate personnel. Good organization of staffs of chemists, engineers, technicians and workmen, the extensive employment of scientists in the development of the chemical industry, and the introduction of improved processes should ensure the realization of the slogan: "Make the Third Five-Year Plan a chemistry plan.''
d) The production of articles of general consumption. Our task is to bring about the utmost expansion of the production of articles of general consumption, by developing all branches of light industry, the food industry and local industry. We must do everything to quicken the development of the textile industry, which is trailing considerably behind the supply of its raw material---cotton. The maximum cooperation on the part of local Party, Soviet and trade-union organizations should do much to accelerate the increase in output of articles of general consumption.
e) In the case of branches of industry that have particularly fallen behind, like the timber industry, the production of building material, fisheries, and some others, we need drastic and immediate measures. The introduction of modern machinery and the proper organization of work, with a properly organized system of encouragement of the best, the most efficient workers, will provide a successful solution of the problem of making good the deficiencies of these branches.
f) In all branches of industry, we must:
First, increase the responsibility of executives---Communists and non-Party people---for the work in their charge, and be more insistent in • our demand for real Bolshevik efficiency in work, which means that executives must concentrate always on the selection of personnel and on keeping a check on fulfilment.
Second, increase our efforts to raise the productivity of labour, to tighten labour discipline, to develop socialist competition and the Stakhanov movement.
Third, reduce the cost of industrial production and improve in every way the quality of production in all branches of industry.
The recent reorganization of the industrial People's 125 Commissariats, that is, their 'division into smaller units, will bring the leadership of the People's Commissariats nearer to the respective establishments and is bound to have a favourable effect on the further advance of our industry.
The Third Five-Year Plan provides for an increase in the output of all branches of agriculture from the 20,100,000,000 rubles (in 1926-27 prices) at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period to 30,500,000,000 rubles at the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period, or a 52 per cent increase.
What will be the increase in the various branches of agriculture?
As regards grain crops, the plan provides for a 27 per cent increase in harvest yields. This means that by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period we must collect a harvest of grain crops amounting approximately to 8,000,000,000 poods. Are we equal to this task? Yes, we are. This is obvious from the fact that already in 1937, as the latest returns show, we had a harvest of 7,340,000,000 poods of grain, and thereby attained in all essentials the aim set by Comrade Stalin--- to .obtain a grain harvest of 7,000,000,000-8,000,000,000 poods. If we work well we shall certainly attain this goal of harvesting 8,000,000,000 poods. To appreciate what these figures mean, we need only recall that in pre-war times the average annual harvest of grain over a period of five years amounted to little more than 4,000,000,000 poods.
As regards industrial crops, the Third Five-Year Plan sets the following tasks for 1942: raw cotton---32,900,000 centners, 19 centners per hectare being the yield specified for irrigated fields, which means an increase in output of 28 per cent; sugar beet---a harvest of 300,000,000 centners, on the basis of a yield of 250 centners per hectare, or an increase in output of 37.2 per cent; flax fibre---8,500,000 centners, on the basis of a yield of 4.6 centners per hectare, or an increase in output of 49 per cent. We must increase the cultivation' of crops like sunflowers, hemp, Indian corn, rubber-bearing plants and new bast plants. Horticulture and viniculture must be intensively developed. We must also provide for a further great increase in the cultivation of subtropical plants like tea and citrus fruits, as well as in sericulture. In the vicinity of large cities we must develop the growing of potatoes and other vegetables, as well as the breeding of livestock, on a scale that will assure them a sufficiency of potatoes and other vegetables and, as far as possible, of milk and meat.
126Exceptionally favourable conditions have been created in our countryside for a rise in the productivity of collective-farm labour. In this respect cotton growing furnishes a very interesting example. No sooner had the state, acting upon Comrade Stalin's initiative in 1935, introduced iSpecial bonuses for increased cotton deliveries, than we began to record tremendous progress in a very short time. Just think: not so long ago, in 1934, the amount of cotton picked in the U.S.S.R. amounted to 12,000,000 centners, while in 1936 it already totalled 24,000,000 centners. In two years the cotton pick had doubled. That this was no adventitious increase we can see from the fact that the cotton yield and the total pick continued to increase steadily in the subsequent years.
Here are more detailed figures for the last five years referring to the Uzbek S.S.R., which is the main cotton producer in the U.S.S.R.:
Crop Yield and Gross Harvest of Raw Cotton
in the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic
Crop yield Total pick ~
Year (in centners (in thousand ~
per hectare) centners)
1934........ 7.9 7,380
1935....... 11.6 10,828
1936....... 16.2 15,161
1937....... 16.1 15,279
1938....... 16.4 15,042'
From these figures we see how cotton yield has progressed in Uzbekistan in the past five years. In 1934 the yield of cotton per hectare in Uzbekistan was 7.9 centners; in 1935, 11.6 centners; in 1936, 16.2 centners; in 1937, 16.1 centners; in 1938, 16.4 centners. It is no longer merely individuals or groups that have been so successful. No, this victory was achieved by the people of Uzbekistan, who have shown in practice what great potentialities are latent in our collective farms. (Applause.)
Thanks also to similar progress made in cotton cultivation in Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and in the Ukraine, the cotton problem is now solved in our country. The textile industry of the U.S.S.R. not only has an ample supply of cotton now, but is no longer able to work up all of it. If we had had no collective farms, such miracles could not have happened. (Applause.) But the collective-farm system, supported by the state with agricultural machines, tractors and mineral fertilizer, has completely altered matters.
127The example of cotton should give all our agriculturists food fol" thought. It shows that we have now exceptionally favourable, previously non-existent opportunities for increasing the productivity of labour in agriculture, and this is not confined to the cotton fields. Since the collective farms have acquired strength, they have begun to show their real power for the advancement of agriculture. All this goes to show that the great aims set by the Third Five-Year Plan for agriculture can and must be attained.
The following measures should supply the basis for the further advancement of our agriculture:
First, the further mechanization of agriculture and its extension to every process of agricultural work, the unfailing and complete provision of tractors with trailer implements and the wider introduction of mechanization for industrial crops;
Second, the intensified application of scientific farming methods, with special attention to seeds;
Third, the introduction in agriculture of a proper system of fertilizing, an increase in the supply of mineral fertilizer and, in general, a more extensive use of chemical methods in agriculture;
Fourth, the adoption of proper -systems of crop rotation and consequently the introduction of proper systems of land improvement.
Under the Third Five-Year Plan livestock will increase more rapidly than crops. During the Third Five-Year Plan period the number of horses is to increase by 35 per cent, cattle by 40 per cent, hogs by 100 per cent, and sheep by 110 per cent. The main prerequisite for such a rapid development of stock breeding is the great increase in fodder supplies envisaged by the plan. The area under fodder crops is to increase from 10,600,000 hectares to 23,600,000 hectares by the end of this period, which means an increase of 123 per cent. Now that the grain problem has been solved, the U.S.S.R. must solve once and for all, during the Third Five-Year Plan period, the livestock problem as well.
In the Third Five-Year Plan period our state farms must definitely become highly productive and highly remunerative. They must really become models of efficient farming.
The All-Union Agricultural Exposition which opens this year should play a great organizational part in improving agriculture. The foremost representatives of all branches of agriculture will take part in this exposition. But that is not the only thing. To qualify for the All-Union Agricultural Exposition, the collective farms, machine and tractor stations and state farms, and also the various categories 128 of agriculturists, must show that they come up to certain fixed standards, which differ for the various crops, branches of agriculture'' and agricultural zones. These standards are such that when the whole mass of collective farms and state farms reach them we shall not merely fulfil but overfulfil the requirements of the Third Five-Year Plan as far as agriculture is concerned. Thus, the All-Union Agricultural Exposition is in effect a program of agricultural progress. It will serve to make the leading agriculturists popular all over the country, will popularize and disseminate the best examples of their work, This exposition will give rise to competition among collective farms, machine and tractor stations and state farms, among districts, regions and republics. It can and must play a big part in organizing further progress in agriculture and in ensuring the fulfilment of the tasks assigned in the Third Five-Year Plan.
I should like to add a few words on a question of supreme importance---the collective farms.
In many cases organizational questions have been seriously neglected by the collective-farm leadership. It is no accident that recently we have had to take a number of measures against breaches of the Rules of the Agricultural Artel. It was not without the influence of hostile elements and downright wreckers that the interests of the subsidiary establishments of the collective farmers began, in sofiie cases, to be set up against the interests of the collective farms. But the peasants have only one sure way of making life better for themselves---the Bolshevik way of strengthening the collective farms. (Applause.)
We must put an end to breaches of the Rules of the Agricultural Artel, bring the size of the subsidiary plots and the number of cattle owned individually by the collective farmers within the range allowed, and give first consideration to the care of collective-farm property, to the consolidation of the collective farms. Then the subsidiary establishments of the collective farmers will also develop properly. This is the way to the further improvement of agriculture, to an abundance of produce in our country, to a well-to-do and cultured life for all collective farmers. The questions of collective-farm discipline and productivity of labour are also completely neglected in some cases. For instance, should we not ask ourselves if it is to be considered normal for some collective farms to have quite a number of members, collective farmers in name only, whose total year's work does not come to a single work-day-unit or at most amounts to some twenty or thirty days' work, just enough to keep up appearances, so to speak? Are these real collective farmers, and should they enjoy all the __PRINTERS_P_129_COMMENT__ 9---263 129 advantages which the state has provided for the collective farms and their members?
And then another*question. The organization of teamwork on the collective farms has played a great part in raising the productivity of . labour and advancing agriculture. So far the team system has spread only to a small part of the collective farms. But this system has been justified by experience and deserves wide acceptance in the collective farms. It is along the lines here indicated that I think additions should be made to the theses on the Third Five-Year Plan.
The enormous growth of the national economy of the Soviet Union and the wide incorporation of remote districts into the economic life of the country puts new big demands on transportation, especially the railways. I need only say that in 1937, for example, 90 per cent of the freight was hauled by the railways, 8 per cent by river transportation, and only 2 per cent by motor transport.
Under the Third Five-Year Plan, railway freight traffic is to increase from 355,000,000,000 ton-kilometres to 510,000,000,000 tonkilometres, that is, by 44 per cent, while the total freight carried is to increase by 52 per cent. At the same time the gross output of industry and agriculture for this period is to increase by 82 per cent. From this it follows that we must take decisive measures to reduce the demands on railway transportation and improve our water and motor transport systems. From this it also follows that we must decidedly curtail cross shipments and certain long-haul shipments. If we correctly plan our industrial and agricultural production and our construction projects, we can eliminate much traffic by organizing the production of the necessary commodities locally. This includes the development of local collieries, the cessation of timber shipments from Siberia to the European part of the country, the prohibition of shipments of potatoes and other vegetables from one region to another, etc.
On the other hand, we must continue to increase considerably the technical equipment of railway transportation. The traffic coefficient per kilometre of railway track in our country is comparatively high. Thus, on the railways in the U.S.A. the annual traffic per kilometre of track is 1,900,000 tons of freight, while in our country at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period we already had a load of 4,200,000 tons per kilometre. Therefore, our tracks, and our rolling stock, too, for that matter, are used much more intensively. This must be 130 considered in our plan for strengthening the plant and the rolling stock of the railways. Our railway construction must ensure the inauguration of approximately 11,000 kilometres of new railway, as against 3,000 kilometres during the Second Five-Year Plan period. Eight thousand kilometres of second track are to be laid, and 1,840 kilometres are to be electrified. The number of locomotives must be increased by 7,370, mainly powerful locomotives, and particularly condenser locomotives. The number of railway cars is to increase by 178,000 four-axle freight cars and 12,000 passenger cars. Automatic coupling is to be provided for 300,000 cars, and automatic brakes for 200,000 freight cars.
Putting- an end to the lag of water transportation and making it play a bigger part in the service of our national economy, especially in the haulage of bulk freights, such as timber, grain, coal and oil, is a problem that brooks no delay.
During the period of the Third Five-Year Plan the'Northern Sea Route is to become a normally functioning water route providing us regular communication with the Far East.
Automobile transport is rapidly acquiring greater importance. The number of automobiles is to increase from 570,000 to 1,700,000 by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period. As many as 2,000,000 chauffeurs, mostly truck drivers, must be trained during this time. The utilization of motor vehicles must be considerably improved.
Our civil aviation service is also developing rapidly, but its activities are somewhat too scattered. It should concentrate on the principal state air lines and see to it that the technical equipment of routes is brought up to the mark.
Under present conditions here, the development of postal, telegraph and telephone communications is of great state importance, but the production of communication equipment has been sadly neglected and the policy on technique is not sufficiently thought out. Serious attention must be paid to organizing and improving our communications facilities.
The Third Five-Year Plan imposes grave responsibilities upon our transportation and communication workers for the further expansion of these branches, the improvement of their technical equipment to meet modern requirements, and better organization in every respect.
The huge plan for the promotion of the national economy in the Third Five-Year Plan period necessitates new construction on a corresponding scale.
__PRINTERS_P_131_COMMENT__ 8* 131The total volume of capital investments during the Third FiveYear Plan period is put at 181,000,000,000 rubles, as against 115,000,000,000 rubles invested during the Second Five-Year Plan period and 51,000,000,000 rubles during the First Five-Year Plan period. Thus, the volume of investments during the Third Five-Year Plan period exceeds the sum total of capital investments under both the First and Second Five-Year Plans.
For what specific purposes are these capital investments to be made?
More than half, or 103,600,000,000 rubles, is to be applied to industrial development, which is an increase of 76 per cent as compared with the Second Five-Year Plan. Of this sum, 87,200,000,000 rubles are to be invested in industry producing means of production, and 16,400,000,000 rubles in industry producing articles of consumption, an increase of almost 100 per cent as compared with the Second Five-Year Plan.
State investments in agriculture amount to 10,700,000,000 rubles, of which over 5,000,000,000 rubles are to be assigned to the machine and tractor stations. This does not include the investments to be made by the collective farms themselves in money and in kind. •• Capital investments in transportation amount to 35,800,000,000 rubles, as against 20,700,000,000 rubles during the Second Five-Year Plan period, that is, an increase of 73 per cent. At the same time capital investments in railway transport are to increase by 82 per cent.
Now let us see what undertakings will be opened up for use as the result of these investments.
The plan provides for the starting of new and reconstructed establishments during the Third Five-Year Plan period representing a value of 182,000,000,000 rubles, as against 103,000,000,000 rubles during the Second Five-Year Plan period and 39,000,000,000 rubles in the First Five-Year Plan period. From this we can see that even taking into account the increase in building costs during the last few years, the establishments brought into operation during the Third Five-Year Plan period will represent a greater production capacity than that of the two previous Five-Year Plan periods put together. (Applause.)
This program of capital construction and the plan for the inauguration of new and reconstructed establishments will ensure a further great increase in the industrial plant of the U.S.S.R. and the building up of certain reserve capacities in the major branches of the national economy. Suffice it to say that our fixed capital in industry is to be doubled.
132Taking industries separately, we shall have the following increases in production capacity: electric power---from 8,100,000 kw. to 17,200,000 kw., that is, more than double; coal---a 70 per cent increase, which, by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period, will bring the capacity of the mines under the People's Commissariat of Fuel up to 285,000,000 tons of coal; oil refining---a 50 per cent increase; pig iron---up to 25,000,000 tons; steel---a 50 per cent increase; copper---a 140 per cent increase; aluminum---a 250 per cent increase; cement---a 50 per cent increase; automobile industry---a 140 per cent increase; cotton spinning industry (spindles)---a 50 per cent increase; • loom manufacturing---a 450 per cent increase; paper---a 50 per cent increase; tire-treads---an almost 200 per cent increase.
Of the biggest industrial construction projects, I shall mention the following: Between the Volga and the Urals we are building a "Second Baku," which by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period is to have an output capacity of 7,000,000 tons of oil. I might remind you that the Baku output of oil in 1913 was 7,700,000 tons. Near Kuibyshev we are working on a project which is the biggest of its kind in the world---the erection of two hydro-electric power stations with an aggregate capacity of 3,400,000 kw. These hydro-electric stations will solve the problem of irrigating the arid lands in the Trans-Volga area, will ensure us stable and plentiful harvests on these lands, and will likewise improve navigation on the Volga and the Kama. We are now solving the vast problem, so important to the state, of establishing a marine and ocean-going fleet, which also requires the establishment of new and powerful facilities for ship building. The Third FiveYear Plan calls for the completion of the Moscow and Gorky automobile works, and of the Magnitogorsk iron and steel mills. During the Third Five-Year Plan period not hundreds, but thousands, of large, small and medium-sized industrial establishments under a vast scheme of construction in all branches of industry will be put into operation throughout the country.
In the sphere of agriculture we shall build 1,500 machine and tractor stations. There is to be a great increase in repair facilities for tractors, combines and other agricultural machines. In the state farms, particularly intensive construction for stock-breeding purposes must be carried on and steps must be taken to instal running water in order to provide model conditions for the keeping of cattle. As regards irrigation and other reclamation schemes, the Third FiveYear Plan provides for the completion of huge projects like the Vakhsh, the Colchis, the Nevinnomys Canal and the Murgab Oasis" development.
133As you know, the shortage of materials is a big drawback in the building industry. The plan contemplates a considerable improvement in this respect. The new People's Commissariat, the People's Commissariat of the Building Materials Industry, must do its utmost to increase production, especially of standard and prefabricated parts.
The plan pays great attention to the proper distribution of construction projects among the several economic districts of the country.
The plan proceeds from the/following premise: In keeping with the best interests of the state, industry should be brought nearer to the • sources of raw material and the consuming districts. This will help to do away with irrational shipments and shipments carried over inordinate distances. It will also be instrumental in the further advance of the economically less developed districts of the U.S.S.R.
In the main economic districts of the Soviet Union we must secure a comprehensive economic development, which means that in each of these districts we must organize a fuel industry and the production of commodities like cement, plaster of Paris, chemical fertilizer and glass, as well as mass consumption goods of the light and food industries in sufficient quantity to meet the needs of these districts. Each republic, territory and region must produce foodstuffs in general mass demand like potatoes and other vegetables, dairy products, flour, confectionery and beer; also manufactures like fancy goods, needle trades goods, furniture, bricks, lime, etc. On the other hand, we must strictly forbid the construction of new plants in Moscow, Leningrad and a number of other major industrial centres of the country. Lastly, in the construction of new factories and mills we must prohibit such narrow specialization as would make the whole country depend upon one special factory for the supply of any given product. Our plans still err in this respect. We must resolutely put an end to this absurd schematism in construction plans.
The districts in the eastern part of the U.S.S.R., primarily the Far East, and also the districts located in the country's interior, are in a class by themselves. They are singled out for special attention in the Third Five-Year Plan.
The example of the Far East makes it particularly obvious that unless we have a comprehensive development of the principal economic centres of the country, we cannot safeguard our vital interests as a state. The Far East must produce locally all its requirements in fuel and, as far as possible, metal, machinery, cement, lumber, and building materials in general, as well as most of the bulk freights of the food and light industries. It goes without saying that the Far East must completely meet its own requirements in potatoes and other 134 vegetables and in general must gird itself to effect a real improvement in agriculture and completely remedy its shortcomings in this sphere. In the Far East industrial construction is developing on a large scale and railways are being built at a rapid rate. During the Third Five-Year Plan period part of the Baikal-Amur Railway will start operations, thus adding another powerful unit to the transportation facilities linking the Far Eastern Territory and Siberia. We regard the Far Eastern Territory as a mighty outpost of Soviet power in the East which must be strengthened in every way. (Thunderous applause.)
The Third Five-Year Plan will greatly increase the economic importance of the Volga Region. The establishment of a rich oil industry, a veritable "Second Baku," and the construction of powerful hydro-electric stations, together with the prospective irrigation of the Trans-Volga area on a wide scale and, a considerable advance in traffic volume over the Volga-Kama river basin will make this region a powerful economic centre, where new industrial construction will develop on a vast scale and great progress will be assured in every line of agriculture.
The plan ensures the further economic and cultural advancement of the national republics and regions. Of the various examples I might mention, I shall cite only the following large construction projects in the Union republics: In the Ukrainian S.S.R., the Krivoy Rog and Zaporozhye iron and steel mills are approaching completion. In the Byelorussian S.S.R., the second section of the Byelorussian state regional electric station is being completed, while extensive construction is under way to develop the peat fields. In the Azerbaijan S.S.R., construction has begun on the Mingichaur state electric station, while the railway between Minzhevan and Julfa, as also the second section of the Baku water works, will be completed. In the Georgian S.S.R., we shall complete the construction necessary for the draining of the Colchis lowlands, as well as the construction of the Black Sea Railway and the Tbilisi knit goods mill. In the Armenian S.S.R.,Ve shall complete the construction of the Kanakir state electric power station and the ``Sovpren'' synthetic rubber works. In the Uzbek S.S.R., the construction of the Chirchik state electric power station and of the Tashkent calico and satin mill is to be completed. Furthermore, the construction of the Zeravshan reservoir is to be started. In the Tajik S.S.R., we are to complete the construction of the Vakhsh irrigation system and the Stalinabad underwear and dress goods factory. In the Turkmen S.S.R., we are to complete the construction of the Ashkhabad electric power station. In the Kazakh S.S.R., we are, to complete the 135 construction of the Balkhash copper works and the Guryev-- MakatKoschagyl oil pipe line, and to build a railway between Akmolinsk and Kartali. In the Kirghiz S.S.R., we are to complete the construction of the Kant-Rybachye railway and of the Chuya irrigation system. The realization of the main objective---to secure a comprehensive development of the principal economic centres of the country---will do much to strengthen the economic base of the national republics, territories and regions.
The plan requires the firm discouragement of megalomania in construction, which has become a positive obsession with a number of our executives; it requires the steady transition to the building of medium and small industrial units in all branches of the national economy, starting with electric power stations. This is necessary for the purpose of speeding up our rates of construction, so that new plants can be put into operation at the earliest possible date, and distributed over the principal economic districts of the country. Small and medium-sized electric power stations must come into vogue.
There are many instances of cases where we embarked upon the construction of gigantic projects, sank a lot of money into these schemes, but their completion dragged out interminably. As an example of what this megalomania can lead to I might mention the Frunze heat-and-power station in Moscow. This station was planned to be a giant, with a capacity of 200,000 kw., the first section to be rated at 100,000 kw. The builders have been on the job since 1932, and it is still unfinished. If we had gone about this job a little more modestly, if we had started off by building not one but several small heat-and-power stations, of, say, 20,000-25,000 kw. each, we would now have two or three heat-and-power stations completed in Moscow. There are quite a few such lessons we have had to learn.
Moreover, the wreckers, who were quite a bane to us in the field of construction, often resorted to various methods of disrupting building operations: They dissipated the money appropriated by starting many construction jobs at the same time. They froze investments by failing to finish a single one of the jobs they had begun. Besides, they began to reconstruct a number of plants just when we could not spare them.
Now we are faced with the task of energetically introducing highspeed, express methods of building. On this score we already have very instructive examples, such as that of parallel operations on construction jobs: building processes and equipment assembly being performed simultaneously, with the workers following a precise time schedule which had been carefully drawn up beforehand. This is 136 possible when proper use is made of mechanization in the building industry, in accordance with a plan prepared in advance, when the technological process of construction is worked out to the last detail; when the required building materials, parts and prefabricated sections are prepared beforehand at the corresponding factories; when the work of the builders on a job is not organized any old way, but runs like clockwork. With express methods we shall accelerate and cheapen construction, while the workers, engineers and technical personnel will earn considerably more. Soon only such work will be considered real Bolshevik work on construction jobs.
Now as to our reserves and potentialities.
1) Our business executives must pay more attention to the economics of production and energetically combat mismanagement,
In his speech at the conference of leaders of industry in 1931, Comrade Stalin said:
``Owing to mismanagement, cost accounting principles have not been applied in a large number of our factories and business organizations. It is a fact that a number of factories and business organizations have long ceased to reckon, to calculate and draw up balance sheets of income and expenditure based on actual figures. It is a fact that in a number of factories and business organizations the conceptions 'regime of economy,' 'cutting down of unproductive expenditure,' and 'rationalization of production' have long gone out of fashion.''
Comrade Stalin posed the question of what was necessary in order to increase our accumulations, in order to secure an increase in capital investments, to strengthen our .defences and cover other state expenditure. He replied that this required:
``putting a stop to bad management, mobilizing the resources inherent in industry, introducing and enforcing cost accounting in all our establishments, systematically reducing production costs, and increasing accumulation within every branch of industry.''
Comrade Stalin's directives hold good to this day in every respect. We still have a lot of mismanagement, much excess expenditure, outrageously large losses of raw materials, much waste of fuel and electric power, disgracefully long stoppages of machinery. That means that in many cases no real struggle is being carried on to reduce the 137 cost of manufactured goods, no real fight is being made to reduce construction costs.
We must put an end to this. We must fight harder against mismanagement and loss of whatever description. We must indeed get attention paid to economics, to the cost of the things we produce. We must ascertain exactly what the work of every establishment, every organization costs the state. But even now we have executives who consider it beneath their dignity to look at a balance sheet, to study returns, to bother about cost accounting. We must put an end to this unconcern for and ignorance of economics, as an antiBolshevik practice detrimental to the state. Then we shall have much less mismanagement.
For instance, can we leave unchallenged such disgraceful facts as the enormous delays occurring in the loading and unloading of vessels in water-way transportation? In 1937, before the wreckers had been ejected from the People's Commissariat of Water Transport, this demurrage reached staggering dimensions. Here are the facts: During season, that is, not counting time spent while laid up for winter or repairs, our dry-cargo tug boats were idle 35 per cent of their working time; oil tanker tugs were idle 33 per cent of their working time; raft tugs 33 per cent of their working time; drycargo barges 71 per cent of their working time; oil barges 56 per cent of their working time; sea-going tankers 29 per cent of their working time. Why,, this means that the water transport fleet was standing idle for almost half of its working time. But even in 1938 matters did not improve. Our comrades in the water transport system must wipe off this stigma, put an end to these delays and set an example of efficient work.
But the example of the water transport system does not apply only to transport organizations; it is equally applicable to many industrial establishments, to state farms and machine and tractor stations. What we must achieve is that everybody in executive position, big and small, should always remember his responsibility to the state and the people, remember his duty to conserve public property, to husband it, to economize in expenditure and indeed take good care of the people's everykopek. (Prolonged applause.)
No less must we be careful with our fuel, must economize our raw materials, take care of equipment, look after our machines, and not waste our timber and building materials.
2) We must emphasize even more the importance of mastering and using to the full the machinery which we now possess in such great quantity; True, in a number of industries we have already 138 demonstrated the wonderful superiority of socialist economy over capitalist economy in this respect. Examine the facts. First example: Our electric power stations are working much more productively, with a much greater use coefficient, than the electric power stations of any other country. We use the capacity of our electric stations with twice the intensivity of the bourgeois countries. We can only feel gratified that in our country electric power generation has already been released from the manacles of capitalism and that we already receive its blessings in abundance. This, however, does not relieve us of the responsibility of preventing overload and risks. Another example: Every kilometre of railway track in our country is used more than twice as intensively as, say> in the United States of America. Of course, even rails have their limits; but let them, too, work harder and better for socialism than for capitalism. (Loud and prolonged applause.) It is also a well-known fact that farm tractors are used in the U.S.S.R. three times as productively as in the United States of America or in Europe. And this with many machine and tractor stations and state farms working far from well. But, if tractors are already working better for us than for Europe or America, that is cause for gratitude and hope that they will work still better in future. (Loud applause.)
But how much of our machinery is still inadequately utilized, how much splendid equipment is still standing idle for great lengths of time without benefit to the state! We must not forget this. Nor must we forget the big reserves that may be derived from the better application of inventions and rationalization measures. Huge new reserves will be revealed in our country as soon as we begin to show real solicitude for our host of inventors and rationalizers, and their assistants. We must actively encourage and promote their work, as Comrade Stalin teaches us, by giving them the necessary material and public support. (Applause.)
3) We must make greater efforts to increase still more the productivity of labour.
We are all well acquainted with Lenin's words that "labour productivity, in the last analysis, is the most important thing, the chief thing for the victory of the new social order." We know also that this thought of our great leader Lenin has been fully grasped by the shock workers and Stakhanovites of our industry and transport, that it has been thoroughly grasped by all the foremost people in the collective farms. But can it be said that there is real Bolshevik organization of effort to achieve a high level of labour productivity in all offices and factories, and in all collective farms? No, it cannot.
139Here is an interesting fact. During both the First and the Second Five-Year Plan periods, the production plan for industry was exceeded. Both the First and the Second Five-Year Plans for industry were exceeded in spite of the fact that the plan of construction was not fulfilled in either case. How could this happen? This could happen only because the productivity of labour in both Five-Year Plan periods proved to be higher than the plans had specified. Consequently, despite all shortcomings in the organization of labour, the workers exceeded the plan figures for productivity of labour and proved to all that we still have a poor knowledge of our real reserves for the advancement of socialist industry.
Consider the following facts: The Second Five-Year Plan provided for a 63 per cent increase in the productivity of labour in industry, Actually it increased by 82 per cent. As you know, the productivity of labour in the building industry was to increase 75 per cent during the Second Five-Year Plan period. Actually it increased by 83 per cent. The shock workers and Stakhanovites disregarded these specifications in the Five-Year Plans. All honour and glory to them for their good work, fo'r their overfulfilment of the plan in regard to productivity of labour. (Applause.)
Our plans for increasing labour productivity during the Second Five-Year Plan period were exceeded because no plan could have made provision for the rise of the Stakhanov movement. And this movement not only did appear, but spread throughout the whole country, spread from town to countryside. We know also that our leading collective farmers often vie with the workers in increasing productivity of labour. Many are the cases where our leading collective farmers, our splendid tractor drivers, combine operators and team leaders increased the productivity of labour to an extent previously undreamed of. Who in our country does not know the names of the splendid people of the period of the Second Five-Year Plan, to whom belongs the honour of having taken the initiative in increasing the productivity of labour and developing socialist competition? Who in our country has never heard of Stakhanov, Dyukanov, the Vinogradova girls, Nikita Izotov, Busygin the smith, Smetanin the Skorokfrod boot and shoe worker, Krivonos and Ognev the locomotive engineers, Tchaikovsky the metal worker, Mussinsky of Archangel, Shashatsky and Gvozdyrkov the miners, the machine-tool maker Gudov, and many others? Who in our country does not know the names of our leading agriculturists, like Maria Demchenko, or Kolyesov, Borin, and the Oskin brothers, combine operators, Pasha Angelina and Pasha Kovardak, tractor girls, and many others?
140In the matter of increasing our efforts to raise the productivity of labour we shall be guided by what Comrade Stalin said at the conference of Stakhanovites:
``Why was it that capitalism smashed and defeated feudalism? Because it created higher standards of labour productivity, which enabled society to procure an incomparably greater quantity of products than was the case under the feudal system. Because it made society richer. Why is it that socialism can, should and certainly will defeat the capitalist system of economy? Because it can furnish superior models of labour, a higher productivity of labour, than the capitalist system of economy. Because it can give society more products and can make society richer than the capitalist system of economy can.''
All this means that if we fight in real earnest against mismanagement, improve the employment of machinery in a Bolshevik manner, develop further the Stakhanov movement and put more energy into our struggle for increased labour productivity and for the actual, not merely nominal, application of the achievements of science and technology to all branches of the national economy, the result will be such an advance in the national economy, such an advance in industry, such an advance in agriculture, such an advance in transportation and all other departments of economic life as we have never witnessed before, as is possible only on the basis of socialist society become strong.
4) If we are to achieve this, we must not weaken, but strengthen, our criticism of the defects in the work of some of our organizations and executives. We must poke fun at the petty-bourgeois boastfulness from which we suffer. Then our business leaders will not lose sight of the Bolshevik guiding thread in the daily routine, nor, on the other hand, will they lose sight of the so-called minor problems, the neglect of which has so often spoiled the success of our work. Unless we have Bolshevik criticism and self-criticism we cannot have Bolshevik leaders. When criticism and self-criticism are practised for the purpose of arriving at a better and quicker solution of problems, of breaking down red tape and dispelling the petty-bourgeois prejudices of stick-in-the-muds, the forces for victory are not weakened, but mobilized for action. We must put new life into our administrative staffs and improve their work to the utmost.
Millions of people in our country are burning with eagerness to go forward, to accelerate the solution of the fundamental economic 141 task of the U.S.S.R.---in the shortest possible time to overtake and outstrip the most highly developed capitalist countries economically. The Third Five-Year Plan assigns the immediate tasks directed toward the prompt attainment of this goal. The more conscientiously we all discharge our duties, the more exacting toward themselves our organizers, our leaders, are, the greater will be our success. (Applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ IV. PLAN FOR A FURTHER RISE IN THE MATERIALThe tune is long past when our country knew unemployment, from which so many millions of workers suffer under capitalism today. The time is long past when there were so many villages in our countryside with such appropriate names as Starvehurst and Hungryville. A good third of the peasants, if not more, were chronically undernourished and could never hope to improve their condition under the old regime. If capitalism had been preserved in our country, it would have had today, like every capitalist country, many a million unemployed in the towns and tens of millions of hungry and semi-ruined peasants in the countryside. But we have now definitely left that state of affairs behind us and are making plans for a rise in the national standard of living which no country, even the richest and capitalistically most developed, can dream of, and which will fully meet the rapidly growing demands of the working people of town and country.
The Third Five-Year Plan provides for an increase in national consumption of from fifty to one hundred per cent. Has there ever been anything like it in capitalist countries? Let at least one capitalist country undertake to raise the standard of living of its people to, well, let us say half the extent of our plan. Let those who boast of bourgeois progress, of the wealth of capital, and so on, try to undertake anything like this. It would be interesting to have a look at such people. But, as you know, they are not to be found. The ruling classes of the capitalist countries do not breed individuals of such bold enterprise.
What does our plan provide for?
I shall begin with the working class.
The plan provides for an increase in the number of workers and employees from 27,000,000 to 32,000,000, or by 5,000,000 persons.
142The average wage of workers and employees is to increase during the period of the Third Five-Year Plan by 35 per cent. The total annual payroll of workers and employees is to increase by over 60 per cent. Of course, increases in wages will be greater in some categories of workers and employees than in others. Those who work better will be ensured an increase in remuneration well above the average level. The Bolsheviks have always been opposed to equalization in wages, as an alien, petty-bourgeois tendency. We must more consistently than ever pursue the policy of giving a material inducement for high productivity of labour on the part of our workers, foremen, engineers and all others professionally trained.
Now as to the peasantry.
The plan envisages a considerable increase in the incomes of the collective farmers in the period of the Third Five-Year Plan. The measures to be taken to improve agriculture should increase by over 70 per cent the cash incomes received by collective farmers for their work-day-units and from the sale of agricultural produce. If we bear in mind, in addition, the increase in the peasants' incomes derived from the further growth of the handicraft industries and other sources of earnings, we may safely say that the increase in incomes in the countryside will be even larger.
It will be seen from this that during the period of the Third FiveYear Plan the incomes of workers, peasants and intellectuals will increase by considerably more than 50 per cent. The question, therefore, is to what extent the increase in goods in the market will correspond to the growth of income.
The reply to this question is furnished by the following two tables:
The Third Five-Year Plan provides for a 72.5 per cent increase of retail trade in manufactured goods. The increase for individual classes of goods will be as follows:
Increase in Market Supply of Principal Manufactured Goods
,., .
1942 in per cent
Commodities
j. 1937
Cotton fabrics........ 160
Woolen fabrics........ 236
Knit goods......... 182
Needle-trades goods..... 163
Footwear (various kinds) . . . 160
Furniture.......... 275
This table shows that in a number of the most important consumers' goods, the increase in the amount supplied to the market will not only keep pace with the increase in the incomes of the working people but even exceed it.
As regards foodstuffs, the Third Five-Year Plan provides for a 53 per cent increase in trade in these articles. The increase for individual staples will be as follows:
Increase in Market Supply of Principal Fo'odstuffs
„ , ,...
1942 in per cent
Commodities
- jno-j
Cereals........... 194
Macaroni.......... 185
Meat............... 202
Poultry........... 263
Sausage . ........... 203
Fish, including herring .... 161
Butter............ 173
Sugar............f
149
Canned goods ........ 305
Eggs .....'....... 250
Cheese........... 197
This table shows that in the case of a number of the principal staples, including meat, butter and eggs, the increase in the amounts supplied to the market will be even larger than in the case of manufactured goods. But inasmuch as the consumption of commodities like flour, bread, salt and vodka, for instance, cannot, for obvious reasons, increase quite so rapidly, the increase in the- ampunt of foodstuffs supplied to the market will, on the whole, be somewhat less than the increase in the amount of manufactured goods supplied to the market. It will be easily understood that this is fully in accord with the interests of the general mass of consumers.
It should be added that according to the plan the volume of public catering is to double. Lastly, it is calculated that trade in the collective-farm markets will more than double.
Provision must be made to increase the number of state and cooperative retail stores accordingly, and to increase the efficiency of the trading system generally. It is time that the People's Commissariat of Trade exercised its right to use the lower floors of new houses as trading premises. We must also develop the building of wholesale 144 centres, warehouses, and cold storages, and organize the cartage and delivery of goods on proper lines. We must increase the number of shops and trading booths in rapidly developing agricultural areas, and stock them with goods to meet the growing demand of the peasants for household, repair and building materials.
Both as regards rate of growth of income and rate of growth of trade, the plan envisages a certain advance of the countryside over the town. This is in accord with the Soviet government's policy of gradually bringing the material and cultural standard of the rural population into line with that of the urban population. It corresponds with our aim---that the working class, the foremost class in our society, should aid the peasantry, whose standard of living has for centuries been lower than that of the working class.
Parallel with this, there will be a considerable increase in government expenditure on cultural and public services for the working people of town and country.
Expenditure on social insurance and government expenditure on education, health, aid to mothers of large families, and other cultural and public services for workers and employees will increase during the period of the Third Five-Year Plan to 53,000,000,000 rubles, or by more than 70 per cent. Government expenditure on measures directly related to the improvement of public health will increase from 10,300,000,000 rubles in 1937 to 16,500,000,000 rubles in 1942. These augmented government appropriations will go to improve the hospital service, extend sanatorium treatment and prophylactic measures, increase maternity aid, add to the number of children's hospitals, and improve labour protection, the services provided for working people during vacations, and the facilities for recreation and sport. The number of hospital beds in the cities of the U.S.S.R. will increase by 30 per cent. The number of hospital beds in rural areas will increase as follows: in the R.S.F.S.R. by 35 per cent; in the Ukrainian S.S.R. by 43 per cent; in the Uzbek, Tajik, Kazakh and Kirghiz Republics by nearly 100 per cent; in the Byelorussian, Azerbaijan and Georgian Republics by over 100 per cent; in the Armenian Republic by over 200 per cent; and in the Turkmen Republic by over 400 per cent. Accommodations in permanent nurseries and kindergartens are to be increased during the period of the Third Five-Year Plan to 4,000,000 places, as compared with 1,800,000 at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period. Accommodations in seasonal nurseries and kindergartens are to be increased from 5,700,000 places to 13,600,000 plac'es.
__PRINTERS_P_145_COMMENT__ 10---263 145With the object of remedying the housing shortage, building operations in cities and industrial hamlets will be intensified. During the period of the Third Five-Year Plan, 35,000,000 square metres of new housing space will be made available for occupation. In addition, it is estimated that private individuals building their own homes will add another 10,000,000 square metres of housing space. We must see to it that this plan is carried out without fail. I must mention here an innovation introduced by the Moscow Soviet. On the initiative of architect Mordvinov, the Moscow Soviet has adopted a special plan of housing construction, over and above its regular plan, providing for the building of 23 houses with a total of 1,610 apartments in the course of this year. These houses will be built by the express method ,.,and with the wide use of standard building parts, which is something to be highly encouraged. The experience gained from this experiment t in Moscow should be applied in other cities.
The plan for city development contemplates a considerable extension of operations for the improvement of urban and industrial centres. It provides for the installation of water supply systems in 50 towns, sewage systems in 45 towns, and street car services in 8 towns. There must be considerable improvement in the building of new public baths, a matter which has been unpardonably neglected. In the cities there must be a real improvement in gas supply, and the practice of hauling huge amounts of wood fuel to the principal cities, which is an obnoxious survival of the past, must be positively reduced to a minimum, and subsequently abandoned altogether.
The Third Five-Year Plan outlines a big program of cultural development.
It provides that full secondary education be made universal in the cities and towns, and that education up to and including the seventh class be made universal in the rural districts and in all the national republics. The number of children attending elementary and secondary schools in towns and industrial hamlets is to increase from 8,600,000 to 12,400,000, and in rural localities from 20,800,000 to 27,700,000. Thus, by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period we shall have over 40,000,000 elementary and secondary school pupils, as compared with 8,000,000 in pre-revolutionary Russia. As to the eighth, ninth and tenth classes of the secondary schools, there are already in these classes twelve times as many pupils as in the old days, and in 1942 there will be 34 times as many as before the revolution. (Applause.) Today there is hardly a working-class family where there are no children with a secondary school education. And 146 the number of families of workers and employees as well as of peasants in which children are receiving a higher education is growing from year to year.
It is interesting to note the growth in attendance at the elementary and secondary schools of the various republics: in the R.S.F.S.R., the Ukrainian S.S.R. and the Georgian S.S.R. it will be 25-35 per cent; in the Byelorussian, Kirghiz and Kazakh Republics 40-50 per cent; in the Azerbaijan, Uzbek and Armenian Republics 55-70 per cent; in the Turkmen and Tajik Republics 90 per cent. Here we see that in those republics in which schooling was practically unattainable by the working people in the past the situation has decidedly changed. While the progress in public education is considerable in all the republics, particular assistance in the advancement of education is given to the more backward national districts.
In view of the vast number of boys and girls who finish secondary school and in the majority of cases enter some practical profession, it is desirable that on graduating from secondary school they should have already received at least some preparatory training for their future professions. This is a very important question, one to which the People's Commissariats of Education---and not only these Commissariats---should give their attention.
The number of students in universities and technical colleges will reach 650,000 in the period of the Third Five-Year Plan. And here main stress must be laid on improving the quality of higher education and, in this connection, on supplying the students with first-class textbooks.
There will also be a further growth in the training of skilled workers in the basic trades---in factory training schools, and in courses for tractor drivers, chauffeurs (mostly truck drivers), and so on. Vocational training of this kind should supply over 8,000,000 skilled workers in the various trades during the period of the Third Five-Year Plan.
The trained personnel with secondary education is to increase 90 per cent by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period; the trained personnel with higher education is to increase 72 per cent, from 750,000 to 1,290,000.
There will be an increase in the number of theatres and moving picture houses open to the general public, of clubs, libraries, reading rooms and cultural centres. The radio and the film, especially sound films, have become a huge cultural force of vast political significance.
Scientific institutions are growing in number. The Third Five-- __PRINTERS_P_147_COMMENT__ 10* 147 Year Plan opens up exceptionally favourable opportunities for our progressive Soviet science.
When we say that a veritable cultural revolution has taken place in our country during the past few years, this is no empty phrase. Indeed, we have created immense forces of intellectuals, of whom until quite recently we experienced a great shortage.
We have hundreds of thousands of offices and factories, and, in addition, 240,000 collective farms. All these require large forces of managerial personnel. Here are some figures supplied to me by Comrade Sautin, head of the Central Board of National-Economic Statistics of the State Planning Commission of the U.S.S.R., showing the number of executive personnel in our offices, factories and collective farms:
Number of Executives of Institutions and Establishments, as of
January 1937
1. Executives of administrative, public health and cultural
institutions .............. ............
450,000
2. Directors and other executives of state industrial .
establishments, shops and departments...............
350,000
3. Chairmen and vice-chairmen of collective farms, and
collectivefarm dairy and livestock department superintendents ....
582,000
4. Directors of machine and tractor stations and of state farms,
and state-farm dairy and livestock department superintendents • 19,000
5. Heads of producers' cooperative organizations........
40,000
6. Store managers and department heads............
250,000
7. Managers of restaurants and other public eating places . . .
60,000
Total.......... 1,751,000
We may therefore consider that the executive personnel in our country numbers not less than 1,750,000 persons. Actually, the figure is much higher, for we should undoubtedly count foremen, leaders of farm brigades and teams, and others as executive personnel, although they are not included in the figure mentioned. It would be more exact to say that this figure of 1,750,000 includes only the higher and intermediate executive personnel in our country.
Now let us consider the Soviet intelligentsia as a whole. Its composition, according to the figures of the Central Board of National 148 Economic Statistics of the State Planning Commission of the U.S.S.R., is as follows:
Composition of the Soviet Intelligentsia, as of January 1937
(By professions)
1. Directors and other executives of establishments,
institutions, factory departments, state farms, collective farms, etc.
1,751,000
2. Engineers and architects (exclusive of directors and other
executives of establishments and factory departments) . .
250,000
3. Intermediate technical personnel (technicians, construction
chiefs, foresters, railroad station masters and others) . . .
810,000
4. Agronomists......................
80,000
5. Miscellaneous scientific personnel for agriculture (land
surveyors and persons specially trained in land improvement,
scientific farming and stock breeding)..........
96,000
6. Scientific workers (professors, university faculty
members and others)....................
80,000
7. Teachers........................
969,000
8. Cultural workers (journalists, librarians, club managers
and others)......................
297,000
9. Art workers......................
159,000
10. Physicians.......................
132,000
11. Intermediate medical personnel (feldshers,^^*^^ midwives and
trained nurses).....................
382,000
12. Economists and statisticians..............
822,000
13. Bookkeepers and accountants..............
1,617,000
14. Judiciary and procurator staffs (judges, procurators,
investigators and others)..................
46,000
15. University and college students.............
650,000
16. Miscellaneous groups of intellectuals (inclusive of the
intelligentsia in the armed forces)............
1,550,000
Total............ . 9,591,000
As you see, our intelligentsia now represents a substantial force of 9,600,000 persons. If we bear in mind that many of the skilled workers in our factories already have a secondary education, this figure should be considerably raised. But even 9,600,000 intellectuals and kindred groups of workers in our Soviet state constitute an imposing figure. Counting members of families, our intelligentsia now comprises about 13-14 per cent of the population of the U.S.S.R. (Loud applause.) It will make its influence felt more than ever when its cultural and technical knowledge and communist consciousness are raised to the level we desire to achieve in the very near future.
It is not difficult to realize how far behind the U.S.iS.R. has left the Russia of pre-revolutionary days. I shall cite only one example, some figures showing the number and composition of the intelligentsia in _-_-_
^^*^^ Feldsher---a medical practitioner of limited authority, primarily for first aid,---Tr. .
149 the Kursk Province in 1913 and in the Kursk Region---which differs very little in" size from the former Kursk Province---in 1937.In 1913 there were 3,000 elementary and secondary school teachers in the Kursk Province; in 1937 there were 24,000 in the Kursk Region. There were 274 physicians; now there are 941. There were 636 persons belonging to the intermediate medical personnel---feldshers and midwives; now there are 2,357. There were 70 agronomists; now there are 2,279. On the other hand, there were 3,189 members of the clergy; now there are 859. Here there is a big drop. (General laughter.) Against this, there are in the present Kursk Region many intellectuals working in Party, Soviet and trade union organizations, whereas there were none such before. These facts need no commentary.
It is in the light of these facts that we must examine the program of cultural development in the Third Five-Year Plan. This program has one basic aim, namely, to make a big forward stride in the historic task of raising the cultural and technical level of the working class to the level of engineers and technicians. To bring out the importance of this task, I would remind you of what Comrade Stalin said at the Stakhanovite conference:
``The elimination of the distinction between mental labour and manual labour can be achieved only by raising the cultural and technical level of the working class to the level of engineers and technicians. It would be absurd to think that this is unfeasible. It is entirely feasible under the Soviet system, where the productive forces of the country are freed from the fetters of capitalism, where labour is freed from the yoke of exploitation, where the working class is in power, and where the younger generation of the working class has every opportunity of obtaining an adequate technical education. There is no reason whatever to doubt that only such a rise in the cultural and technical level of the working class can undermine the basis of the distinction between mental labour and manual labour, that it alone can ensure the high level of productivity of labour and the abundance of articles of consumption which are necessary in order to begin the transition from socialism to communism.
``In this connection, the Stakhanov movement is significant for the fact that it contains the first beginnings, still feeble, it is true, but nevertheless the beginnings, of precisely such a rise in the cultural and technical level of the working class of our country.''
For the achievement of this huge task of abolishing the distinction between mental and manual labour, five or ten years will, of course, 150 not be enough. Its full achievement will require several decades. But we are making good progress along this path. The Third Five-Year Plan will bring us a step closer to the accomplishment of this great aim.
As you see, the aim set in the Third Five-Year Plan of a further rapid rise in the material and cultural standard of the working people, and the satisfaction of the growing and variegated demands of the peoples of the U.S.S.R., is in harmony with the new era, the era of gradual transition from socialism to communism, on which the U.S.S.R. has entered.
The apologists of the bourgeois system cut a poor and ridiculous figure. Reams of paper have been filled in the attempt to show that socialism means poverty and want, that socialism is worthy of barbarians and not of civilized people. Piles of books are still being published and millions of tons of newsprint wasted on the dissemination of the lie that communism means making all men equal in poverty and intellectual dearth, that communism is a long step back from modern capitalist society. These wretched fables of the bourgeois hacks have been exploded by the progress of the Soviet Union. In vain do the bourgeoisie and its minions---the Trotskyites, fascists, Miensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries---waste so much valuable paper on this hopeless cause. Why, it is nothing short of a crime, an unpardonable waste of public wealth, of that invaluable article, paper, which is so indispensable to real culture. Today, after all that has been done in our country to increase the national prosperity and to raise the cultural standard of the working people, today, when new colossal plans are being mapped out for the production of every kind of article and product, and when wide prospects have been opened for the creation of real abundance in the ILS.S'.R., today so much paper and effort can be wasted on these nursery tales about the Soviet Union only by those who burn the classics of literature and science in their public squares and whose brains are impregnated with the soot of these bonfires, or by those who no longer believe that decaying capitalism can be defended by fair means.
To us the conclusions to be drawn from all these facts are clear.
We are well aware that our Soviet system has already created all the requisites for a further rapid rise in the material and cultural ' standard of the working people, for the creation of an abundance of goods and products, and for the satisfaction of the rapidly growing cultural demands of the working people. Everything now depends on the growing communist consciousness of the workers, peasants and intellectuals. It is on the success of communist education, in the broad 151 meaning of the term---a communist education embracing the whole mass of the working people and the whole body of the Soviet intelligentsia----it is, above all, on our success in this sphere that the accomplishment of all our other tasks depends.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ V. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE THIRD FIVE-YEAR PLANThe Third Five-Year Plan differs substantially from the First and Second Five-Year Plans. At that time the purpose was to lay the foundation of socialist society. Now socialist society has, in the main, been built. The Soviet Union has entered a new phase, the phase of completion of the building of classless, socialist society and of gradual transition from socialism to communism. That is the chief difference between the present and the earlier period.
The new phase entails new duties and new difficulties. We know that every undertaking, even the smallest, has its difficulties. And the huge growth in the strength of our country also presents certain difficulties. Our situation being what it is, we have to consider not only purely internal questions, but also questions that arise because of the existence of a hostile imperialist encirclement. But one need only glance at the faces of the people of our country to see that they have never been so happy as they are now, when tackling the complex and difficult tasks involved in the gradual transition from socialism to communism. (Applause.) This can be explained only by one thing, namely, that they are sure they will win, that they have an unshakeable faith in victory!
The working people of the U.S.S,R. know exactly what has to be doneynext, what is the principal task of the moment. This task may be defined as follows: to initiate along the whole line competition for economic primacy with capitalism, with the economically most developed capitalist countries of Europe, and with the United States of America. This implies a struggle to overtake and outstrip the advanced capitalist countries economically.
We might be told: "Here you are, entering into a match with the capitalist countries when you have not yet overtaken them." But that does not worry us. It is true that in the U.S.S.R. the output per head of population of such important industries as, let us say, pig iron and electric power production is less than in the United States or Germany. But, on the other hand, it is indisputable that the technical level of our industry is already higher than that of any other country of Europe, not to mention agriculture, the technical level of which is not lower than even that of America. And, what is most important, 152 our young Soviet state has gained full strength and abounds in energy, health and unshakeable unity. (Stormy applause.) And so we think that it is high time the young but already robust Soviet forces entered the arena of international competition for economic primacy. ( Applause.)
This, of course, is no threat; and such peaceful competition can injure nobody. Nevertheless, it will be a trial-of strength on a big scale.
It must be confessed that nobody is challenging us to competition. (Laughter and applause.) It may even be said that, generally speaking, we came into the world uninvited. But having come into the world, we want to uphold, and shall uphold, the cause of the October Revolution. (Applause.)
They may say: "We have our hands full without your competition. We have enough worries as it is," (Laughter and applause.) Let them! On suitable occasions we did collaborate with bourgeois countries, and think it quite expedient to do so. Nor have we any intention of refusing to do so in the future, but shall strive to extend this collaboration with our neighbours and with all other states as much as possible. However, we are going our way, and capitalism is going its way. History confronts the U.S.S.R. not only with the question of collaborating with the capitalist countries but also with the question of a competition between the two economic systems---the new and the old, between the U.S.S.R. and the principal capitalist countries---for primacy in the economic field.
We enter this competition confident in our inherent powers and sure of our victory. The picture is quite different in the capitalist camp. There they have long since lost faith in inherent powers of development. There, passions are raging over a new redivision of the world. There---some with knives in their belts, others with sword in hand---they are fighting for colonies and for a recarving of states in the interests of the stronger powers. There, they hold forth in endless speech on the subject of who was cheated, and by whom, in the division of colonial territories after the first imperialist war, oh who was the robber and who the robbed in the division of spoils during the last reshuffling of colonies and in the post-war sharing up of territories in Europe. There it is no longer a question of mere threats of war. An imperialist war, involving a number of countries in Europe and Asia, is already on and has assumed vast dimensions. The danger of a new world-wide slaughter is growing, and it comes chiefly from the fascists and their sponsors;
But our people, after ally may have their own opinion in this 153 matter. They will proceed primarily from their own experience, from the way the nations of the Soviet Union are accomplishing their economic development and steadily advancing along the road of progress, not by the seizure of colonies and the receipt of help from outside, but exclusively through the growth of the internal forces of the country. In our country a way has been found to economic development and the advancement of national cultures without the exercise of violence by one nation against another, but by the concerted effort of many nations in one common cause. Even in our country, not all the republics are equally developed in the sphere of industry and agriculture. Some are more developed in one way, others in another. But we have found a splendid means of uniting in one common effort the efforts of all the workers and peasants of the multi-national Soviet Union, of uniting the efforts of different nations, of having one nation help the other and of working for one common end. Our people might turn to the West, for example, and say: "Our experience is not a bad one. Why not take advantage of it? All these 'axes,' you know, will get severely jolted at the first big bump in the road, and may fly in pieces. But a good Union of Nations is no rickety `axis'---it is a great thing!" This is a voice which many over there will not want to listen to, of course. But it is very importunate and, penetrating deep down among the masses, will in time return to us in a mighty proletarian echo.
What do we intend to rely on in solving the problem of "overtaking and outstripping"? We can give a simple answer to this. On planning, and, first and foremost, on the Third Five-Year Plan. But that is not enough. We have the moral and political unity of the people; we have the great mutual friendship of the nations of the Soviet Union; and the plans lend unity of purpose and unity of aim to the efforts of the entire nation, to all our work. That is why our plan, our Bolshevik plan, our Stalinist plan, is so great a force. (Applause.} Working to plan means knowing what has to be done and for what purpose it has to be done. In our country plans have become an indispensable organizing force. Therefore, the fulfilment of a plan once adopted has become a matter of honour for the working people of the U.S.S.R.
Thanks to the brilliant success of the First and Second Five-Year Plans, ``planning'' has attained world-wide popularity, and quite a number of laborious attempts have been made by capitalist countries to proclaim and boost economic plans. Take, for example, the hullabaloo raised by the German fascists over their two home-grown "Four-Year Plans"! There were demagogues who tried to make believe 154 that they had already overcome the anarchy in the capitalist economic system, the system prevailing in their country, and that they were already working by plan. Nevertheless, they did not venture to publish any plans---either the first or the second four-year plan. Apparently, they never existed. All that these "four-year plans" amounted to was certain measures for the accumulation of resources for a new war. And when carried into practice, the gist of their "four-year plans" amounted to the establishment of a system of barefaced exploitation of the workers and of all common people for the sake of maintaining the rule of capital, and especially for the sake of strengthening one "race," if we may call it so, the ``race'' so dear to the hearts of the fascists---finance capital. But the other "race," the working people, are having a hard time under the fascist "four-year plans." For the workers, the "four-year plans" were a calamity, a new form of bondage. Compulsory labour has been introduced in the mills and factories; the working day has been increased to ten or twelve hours and more; it is forbidden to raise wages, but there is no check on the rise of prices. Nor have the fascist gentry left the other sections of the working population in peace: thousands of peasant farms have been sold under the hammer; hundreds of thousands of artisans, small tradesmen and others have been ruined. That is the true picture of the fascist "four-year plans.''
In spite of all this, we are firmly convinced that the fascists will not succeed in discrediting the idea of economic planning. The success of our glorious Stalinist Five-Year Plans will find its way to the hearts of millions of working people far beyond the frontiers of the U.S.S.R., and fire them with the wish to have their own, Bolshevik Five-Year Plans, and not the enslaving "four-year plans" of the fascist taskmasters. (Loud and prolonged applause.}
Capitalism, including capitalism in fascist garb, is powerless to match our planned economic system. Because of its system of private property, capitalism, including capitalism in fascist! garb, is in its very essence incompatible with economic planning. Therefore, when national-economic planning began to display its miracle-working powers, capitalism, had already, definitely become a survival of history, a brake on history, a reactionary phenomenon of our day.
What can compare with the achievements of the planned, socialist economic system of the U.S.S.R.? We had the First Five-Year Plan: its effect was to double industrial output in four years, to increase it by 102 per cent. Then came the Second Five-Year Plan: an increase of industrial output by another 110 per cent was envisaged, but, actually, an increase of industrial output by 121 per cent, that is, two and one-- 155 fifth times as much, was achieved. Now we have a new plan, the Third Five-Year Plan. Again we are contemplating to almost double industrial output in five years, or, to be exact, to increase it by 90 per cent. There you have what the Bolsheviks call the all-conquering power of communism. (Loud and prolonged applause.) And to those who do not believe in communism, we may say: "Just you wait a bit, and history will utter its last word to all such doubting Thomases, to all of them lumped together." (Laughter and applause.)
I have had to speak of all this in order to give an idea of the state of foreign affairs in which our peaceful competition with the capitalist countries for economic primacy is now developing.
It will also be seen from the above that this competition will be transformed into a competition of a higher type, the historic competition between two social systems---capitalism and communism.
Capitalism has accumulated no little store of material and cultural values, but it is no longer able to use them even in its own interests. It has already in many respects begun to strangle progress, science, art and culture. That is a fact; but, then, all the worse for capitalism. There is now somebody to take over the heritage of capitalism. Communism grows out of what capitalism has created, out of its numerous fine achievements in the sphere of economy, material life and culture. Communism reassesses all these values and achievements in its own way---not in the interests of the ``elite'' of society, but in the interests of the whole people, of all mankind. We must spare no efforts to study this cultural heritage. We must know it thoroughly and profoundly. We must utilize everything produced by capitalism and the earlier history of mankind, and from the bricks made by the labour of man in the course of many centuries build a new edifice, a bright, spacious and sunlit edifice suited to the life of the people. (Loud and general applause.) The building of this splendid edifice of communism will demand a great deal of new energy and of talent of the people, a great deal of labour and heroism, of courage, initiative and enthusiasm. The Soviet Union---there you have an example of how to set about this work! The Bolshevik strength required for this glorious task is imparted by our Party, the Party of Lenin-Stalin. (Loud and prolonged cheers.) What does Comrade Stalin's report at this Congress mean? It means that the Bolshevik spirit is imparted to our cause by the work, the thoughts and words, of our Stalin! (Loud applause. Cheers for Comrade Stalin.)
Our intelligentsia has a part of exceptional importance to play in this historic work. Men of culture, men of science and technology, the old intelligentsia and the new, our students, and our skilled workers, 156 whose ranks are being reinforced by youth, are all needed to enable the Soviet people to cope with the great new tasks, to accomplish the main economic task that now has to be performed, to successfully fulfil the Third Five-Year Plan. On their capacity to organize the labour of the workers and peasants, on their skill in applying their scientific knowledge to the utilization of technology and to the attainment of the utmost increase in labour productivity will depend the success of our work, the success of the competition with the other countries for economic primacy upon which the U.S.S.R. is now entering, and the success of the historic competition between communism and capitalism. Their creative efforts will be the more fertile and their achievements the more remarkable, the more consistently and deeply they delve into the essence of the fundamental modern science of society and the state---the essence of the great teachings of MarxismLeninism, which is the basis for the growth and strength of socialist construction in the U.S.S.R. We have already created so many of the requisites, so many potentialities for the further growth and full prosperity of our society, that the chief thing now is a conscious communist attitude towards our work, and, especially, successful Bolshevik activity in the sphere of the ideological training of the swelling ranks of our Soviet intelligentsia.
The time has come when the work of education, the communist education of the people, assumes prime importance. This estimate of the role of communist education at the present juncture in no way detracts from the duty of which Comrade Stalin spoke, the duty of keeping our people in a state of mobilization and readiness for any and every emergency. On the contrary, only that education may be called a communist education which adds to our state of mobilization and readiness, and enhances our capacity to engage in a supreme struggle, in new battles, for the victory of communism. (Prolonged applause.)
The time is not far off when the Soviet Union will be in a position to say to others: "Do not lag behind the U.S.S.R. economically either, if you want to be in the forefront of humanity along the whole line and in all respects.''
The banner of the Third Five-Year Plan is being taken up by millions of workers, by the many millions of the working people. The general line of our advance towards communism is laid down for us by the Party of Lenin-Stalin, by our Bolshevik Congress, by our Stalin! (Loud and prolonged applause and cheers. All rise. Cheers for Comrades Stalin and Molotov.)
157 __ALPHA_LVL2__ SPEECH IN REPLY TO THE DISCUSSIONComrades, the discussion at our Congress has shown that the theses for the Third Five-Year Plan have met with the unanimous support of the delegates. (Applause.)
I shall deal separately with certain questions raised by comrades who have spoken here. In my reply to the discussion I want to remedy an omission on my part. In order to do so I must go into the preCongress discussion, its character and results.
Before the Congress the theses, as you know, were very widely discussed in the press, at Party meetings and among the masses of the people. This very active response is symptomatic of the political advance in our country resulting from the general activity of our Party, from its achievements in the political field and in economic and cultural development. Thousands of letters dealing with questions of the Third Five-Year Plan were received by the Pravda for publication in its Discussion Sheet. A considerable number of these letters were published. In addition, many articles dealing with questions concerning the Third Five-Year Plan appeared in other publications, both central and local.
The pre-Congress discussion revealed that the theses for the Third Five-Year Plan had the full support of the Party organization and the mass of the people. All the Party conferences that preceded the Congress expressed their approval of the theses. In addition, the discussion brought out a wide variety of questions, and yielded quite a number of proposals for additions and other concrete amendments to the theses. These proposals contain much that is sound and useful. It must be said that to incorporate the majority of these proposals in the theses would inflate them too much and obscure the essentials. This of course we must avoid. But on the other hand, quite a number of proposals made in the pre-Congress discussion were such as to merit consideration in our Five-Year Plan.
But the theses are not the plan. They only provide a basis for the plan. The plan itself is a very voluminous document. The Third 158 Five-Year Plan runs into several folios of tables and figures. This plan takes up a great variety of points, in the final adoption and formulation of which it will be highly important, in fact essential, to consider the proposals and amendments which were made during the pre-Congress discussion. The great activity displayed by the Party and non-Party comrades who contributed to the pre-Congress discussion will be a great help to us in the final elaboration of the Third Five-Year Plan, and we should consider some of their proposals when adopting the theses in their final formulation.
If the Congress accepts the theses before it as a basis, it will obviously have to elect a commission to discuss which additions and other amendments should be incorporated in the theses. Furthermore, the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars will have to consider a number of these proposals and amendments when they finally endorse the Five-Year Plan by branches of the national economy, territories and republics.
The questions raised during the pre-Congress discussion and at the Congress might'well be divided into the following groups:
First: questions of organization to ensure plan fulfilment;
Second: major economic problems;
Third: questions concerning particular branches of the national economy;
Fourth: problems of a more general character involving questions of principle.
Bolsheviks fully realize the importance of questions of organization in solving economic problems. Hence it is but natural that great attention was paid to questions of organization in the discussion on the Third Five-Year Plan. Contributors to the pre-Congress discussion raised a number of important questions of organization, including proposals to organize new People's Commissariats, and new Committees under the Council of People's Commissars. For instance, we have had proposals to form a People's Commissariat of the Building Industry; to organize, apart from the People's Commissariat of Agriculture, a special People's Commissariat for the Administration of Machine and Tractor Stations; to divide the People's Commissariat of State Farms into two People's Commissariats---one for state livestock farms and the other for state crop farms; to form a new People's Commissariat of the Automobile Industry or of Automobile Roads, and so on and so forth. A number of proposals of this kind deserve serious attention and might be accepted upon a further examination of the question.
159Among these proposals there was one suggesting the formation of a special People's Commissariat of Horse Breeding. This proposal is not a sound one, in my opinion. But, on the other hand, careful attention should be paid to Comrade Budyonny's proposal that the People's Commissariat of Agriculture have a special Assistant People's Commissar, and the various agricultural bodies territorial Land Department chiefs, to supervise horse-breeding. The task of improving the breeding of horses is so important that a number of new organizational changes are indispensable here.
During the pre-Congress discussion, and here at the Congress as well, attention has been drawn to the need for better and closer coordination among the People's Commissariats in the discharge of current business. In connection with the division of the industrial People's Commissariats into smaller units, this is a very urgent matter. Speaking at the Congress, the People's Commissar of the Heavy Machinery Industry, Comrade Malyshev, correctly pointed out that the Economic Council and the State Planning Commission must take into account that coordination of work among the various economic People's Commissariats must be better organized than it is at present. This was also quite correctly pointed out by Comrade M,. M. Kaganovich in his speech. The formation of industrial People's -- Commissariats on more highly specialized lines puts them within closer reach of the establishments concerned, with very important and beneficial results. But, on the other hand, many questions arise nowadays which cannot be solved behind the office doors of one single People's Commissariat. In view of this the Economic Council of the Council of People's Commissars must undoubtedly increase its staff and display much greater activity in coordinating the work of the People's Commissariats. This does not mean that the various People's Commissariats should make no effort themselves to coordinate their work with the work of the other People's Commissariats. It is their duty to do so, and they must not wall themselves up to suit their narrow departmental interests. This narrow departmentalism is not a rare occurrence among us, but we must strenuously combat it in our work as a form of bureaucracy. At the same time, the considerable increase in the number of industrial People's Commissariats unavoidably makes the structure of national-economic management more complicated at the top and calls for a corresponding increase in the staff's of the State Planning Commission and the Economic Council. From this the proper practical conclusions must be drawn.
Of the various economic problems I shall dwell upon the 160 following: the settling of the Far East, the Kursk Magnetic Anomaly,^^*^^ the Volga-Don Canal, and the development of the oil fields in Bashkiria.
You know that the question of the economic development of the Far East has come well to the fore. Hence to organize the settling of the Far East has become a task of the highest importance. In an article contributed to the pre-Congress discussion, Comrade Donskoy rightly referred to this question as a problem of major importance to the state. And indeed, both our Far-Eastern territories must tackle this question in real earnest, and organize large settlement offices locally to meet this need. It is high time we went from words to deeds, from general proposals to specific plans and decisions, in dealing with this question.
In the discussion on the Third Five-Year Plan, stress has been laid on the question of the Kursk Miagnetic Anomaly and the formation of an iron and steel producing district in its vicinity. Wreckers have done their share in holding up the scheme. It is time we remedied these after-effects of wrecking. We must proceed to develop energetically the iron ore deposits there, and set up an iron and steel industry in the vicinity of the Kursk Magnetic Anomaly. This project has a great future in connection with the development of iron and steel production in the U.S.SjR. Comrade Doronin was right when in his speech at the Congress he demanded that this subject be given serious attention in the Third Five-Year Plan; it should be mentioned in the theses as well.
The Volga-Don Canal project has also been discussed at the Congress. This is another of the major economic tasks we must tackle in the Third Five-Year Plan period. The reason why the VolgajDon problem was held up is that a number of other problems, the construction of giant power stations, for instance, had at one time or other been lumped together with it. At the present time the State Planning Commission of the Soviet Union is finishing its work on the details of this development, and in the near future we shall revert back to it for concrete discussion. Comrade Dvinsky's raising of the question here was seasonable, as was his proposal to increase the output of coal in the Rostov \Region, where the coal deposits are very rich.
I must also touch on the question of the oil industry in the vicinity of the Urals. Comrade Shagimardanov from Bashkiria was quite right in demanding that more attention be devoted to the Bashkir oil industry. Several years ago, at the Seventeenth Party Congress, Comrade Stalin said that we must "set to work in real earnest to _-_-_
^^*^^ Huge iron-ore deposits in the Kursk Region, discovered through large deviation in magnetic needle.---Tr.
__PRINTERS_P_161_COMMENT__ 11---263 161 organize an oil base along the western and southern slopes of the Ural mountain range." Chief among the districts he had in mind was Bashkiria.The actual development of the oil industry in this district can be seen from, the following facts. The first year in which Bashkiria produced oil on a commercial basis was 1934. It was a matter of some 63,000 tons. The value of Bashkiria as an oil region can be gauged by the fact that the output in 1935, only a twelve-month later, was 406,000 tons. In other words, the output multiplied more than six times in the space of one year. In 1936, the output of oil in this district reached 968,000 tons. In other words, there was a further increase to almost two and a half tinles as much in the space of a year. But in 1937 the increase was not continued, the total output being only 957,000 tons of oil, while in 1938 the output was 1,145,000 tons, a by no means considerable increase. Now compare these facts with the following figures showing the capital invested in the Bashkiria Oil Trust. Capital expenditure on this trust was as follows: 45,000,000 rubles in 1935; 59,000,000 rubles in 1936; 49,000,000 rubles in 1937; and 45,000,000 rubles in 1938. As you see, these are not heavy investments for such a big industrial undertaking. The outstanding fact here is that instead of investments increasing they decreased in the last two years, in spite of the fact that the Party has often insisted on the economic importance of this oil district to the whole country.
One is forced to conclude from the above that here our economic planning has been very remiss. If, in the present case, more attention had been paid to plans for the development of oil mining, then the plan of capital investments would have been different, would have been more ambitious. The wreckers, whose anti-Soviet handiwork this was, were detected late and so the state's interests were damaged by a delay of at least two years in the development of the Bashkiria oil fields. Let this be another.lesson to us; let it teach us to improve our planning of industrial expansion and never to allow anything to retard the development of such important branches of our national economy.
I shall now turn to the separate branches of our national economy.
I shall commence with industry.
In the pre-Congress discussion, and here at the Congress, stress was laid on the need for a somewhat greater development of certain branches of industry than is indicated in the theses. The paper industry and the cement industry are cases in point. Indeed, there 162 is such a big demarfd for paper that we should probe again the possibility of increasing the plan for the development of the paper industry in the Third Five-Year Plan period. The same applies to the production of cement. The Third Five-Year Plan provides for such an expansion of building activities that we would do well to rediscuss the possibility of increasing the program in the case of the cement industry.
The greatest attention, before and during the Congress, has been paid to fuel, as we can well understand. Every branch of the national economy has already felt keenly the effects of the present inadequate output of fuel: the shortage of coal, the shortage of oil, and also the inadequate attention paid to fuels like peat, oil shales and sapropel coals and turf. Most earnest attention must be paid to these questions in the Third Five-Year Plan. I have not much to add to what I said in my report.
You know that we are planning big industrial developments in the vicinity of the Volga, but that until recently they were delayed owing to a shortage of fuel. Comrade Stalin specially called our attention to the need for measures to develop collieries in the vicinity of the Volga. The People's Commissariat of the Fuel Industry investigated the matter and recently made a proposal to develop the Dombarovo deposits in the Chkalov Region. Comrade Kaganovich made the necessary draft, which was sanctioned by the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars a few days ago. The following tasks have been imposed on the People's Commissariat of the Fuel Industry in this decision: to sink ten pits, with a total capacity of 1,000,000 tons, in the Dombarovo fields in 1939, six of them to be completed and opened this year; furthermore, it has been decided to sink this year four pits with a total capacity of 400,000 tons in the Poltava-Bredy and Borodino districts, and 3 pits with a total capacity of 300,000 tons in the Ber-Chogur fields. By the end of 1942, the capacity of the new mines to be opened in these districts should total 7,700,000 tons. This will provide a sound basis for improving the supply of fuel to the Orsk industrial district and the Volga regions, as well as to the railways involved, which at the present time are running on coal hauled all the way from the Kuznetsk and Donetz fields.
This is only one example of how persistent we must be in our approach to the problem of supplying all our economic regions with locally produced fuel. Steps must be taken in all the principal economic districts to" organize local fuel industries, so as to release our railways completely from the onus of long-distance hauls of coal.
163We must also discontinue a practice that still persists in the fuelling of our cities. To this very day Moscow, Leningrad and other big cities are largely supplied with wood fuel carried by rail. In view of the present dimensions of industrial production in our large cities, to overload the railways with large shipments of wood fuel hauled over long distances is simply impermissible. Comrade Bogdanov, who spoke here, was quite right in his demand that we put a stop to the disgraceful practice of bringing wood fuel to Leningrad by rail from districts a thousand and more kilometres away. We cannot resign ourselves to such a state of affairs. This is an impermissible practice that has come down to us from the days when these shipments were much lighter. The widespread introduction of gas in our large cities will help us to get rid of such economic absurdities as long haul shipments of wood by rail. The sooner this is done the better.
Now a few words about electric power, to which enormous attention was devoted both at the Congress and during the pre-Congress discussion. This question has become so acute because the demand for electric power has left the capacity of our electric stations far behind. We must stimulate energetically the construction of medium and modest-sized electric power stations, and furthermore encourage to the utmost the construction of small power stations, especially of small hydro-electric stations. In this connection it has been properly pointed out that the construction of these electric power stations will necessitate a considerable increase in the output of turbines, especially of small hydraulic turbines. It is our duty to make adequate provision for these needs in the Third Five-Year Plan.
An important place in the Third Five-Year Plan is held by the construction of the Kuibyshev hydro-electric power station development. This great project is already well under way. Our Third FiveYear Plan must make provision for the proper utilization of the tremendous electric power which we shall derive from these power stations. We must plan industrial construction, irrigation systems and urban electric supply accordingly.
Besides this gigantic hydro-electric development, the construction of new hydro-electric stations on smaller scales is also of great importance. Recently Comrade Stalin specially drew the attention of Comrade Pervukhin, People's Commissar of Electric Power Stations and of the Electrical Industry, to the need for a number of hydroelectric power stations in the Donetz coal fields and the Ural districts. The Donetz coal fields are desperately in need of additional electric power. Why not make use of the Donetz River, by building one or two hydro-electric power stations, not of gigantic dimensions, but with a 164 fair capacity? There is a shortage of electric power in Sverdlovsk and Chelyabinsk. Why not make use of the rivers Iset, Chusovaya and Mias and build hydro-electric power stations there as well? They would be a great help to the Urals in this matter. These and similar projects should be incorporated in the Third Five-Year Plan.
Now the question of machine-building. We must pay the most serious attention to this problem. The line we are pursuing is to continue, on an ever increasing scale, the modernization of all our industries in point of equipment. Unless we have a further big increase in technical equipment, unless we have a constant improvement in our technical level, unless we use to the utmost the latest achievements in world engineering, Soviet economic development cannot continue at the rates which the country requires. This question was debated at length during the pre-Congress discussion and here at the Congress. We must organize the production of many new types of machinery and equipment for the various branches of our national economy. Machine-tool manufacturing, in particular, must be brought up to the mark. We must properly organize production of automatic control apparatus for the hydro-electric power stations I have mentioned, and for the textile and other industries. We must organize the production of mechanized tools, which can often be used as substitutes for more complex equipment in our factories, machine and tractor repair shops, and elsewhere. The need for the further development of machinery manufacture is greatly felt in all branches of our national economy.
But the following points must be considered too. For instance, in agriculture the main problem now is mechanization: to provide all tractors with the proper trailer implements. This we have not yet achieved by far, but achieve it we must, and .that as soon as possible. But we must not forget horse-drawn implements either, as Comrade Benedictov has rightly pointed out at this Congress. Unfortunately, all too little thought has been given to this matter in recent years, and it has been unpardonably neglected.
During the pre-Congress discussion a great deal was said concerning the further development of the automobile industry, particularly the manufacture of light automobiles. The Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars have already taken a decision on this question. The People's Commissariat of the Medium Machinery Industry, with Comrade Likhachov at its head, will have to work with a will if it is to cope with its new task of starting the output of light Soviet automobiles in the present year. (Applause.)
As regards iron and steel production, I have not much to add to 165 what I said in. my report. In the pre-Congress discussion stress was laid on the necessity for strict economy in the use of ferrous and non-ferrous metals, and rightly so. We must have better system and effect decided economies in our consumption of pig iron, steel, special steels, and especially copper and other non-ferrous metals. There is still a lot of mismanagement in this respect, and we must put a stop to it. On this head, and on the general question of waste-abatement, I think some points must be added to the theses.
The chemical industry. The importance of increasing the gas supply has been indicated in the theses. Special mention should be made in the theses of the need to increase the supply of gas to cities and towns. Furthermore, attention should be drawn to the question of mineral fertilizers. There is urgent need for greater care in the handling of fertilizer. We can no longer tolerate the present enormous waste of mineral fertilizer in transit and storage. We must organize a vigorous campaign against such bad management, and at the same time must organize the production of machines for putting fertilizer into the soil. Of the various branches of the chemical industry I shall refer here only to the asbestos industry, which, as Comrade Tsalkovich has justly pointed out in the press, must be developed as quickly as possible.
Now as to the production of articles of general consumption. Comrade Kosygin, People's Commissar of the Textile Industry, was quite right in his speech at the Congress, in which he presented various demands for assistance to the textile industry from our other industries. It is our duty to render the utmost support to the cotton industry, so as to promote its speedy advancement. But our comrades in the textile industry must remember that success depends largely on themselves, on their own efforts to improve their work, to consolidate and increase the growth in output that has already begun in our mills. It is high time that our comrades in the textile industry discarded the bad habit of not fulfilling their plans, and fell into line with those who know how to fight for fulfilment and overfulfilment of the assigned plans. Nor must we forget such things as the output of hosiery, which has been referred to in the press. We must really develop this industry on a local scale too, and put an end to the shortage of such simple things in our stores.
Lastly, our fisheries. To what has been said at the Congress I can only add that while there is every call for most earnest attention to the problem of rapidly effecting a great improvement in the main fisheries at Murmansk and in the North generally, as well as in the Caspian, the Sea of Azov, and the Far East, we must make the most 166 of local resources, and put them under the attention and control of the local organizations. The specifications in the theses concerning the fishing industry must be amplified somewhat.
As to agriculture.
The pre-Congress discussion dealt largely with the further mechanization of agriculture,. and, in particular, with the question of introducing gas generating tractors and automobiles. Furthermore, there have been legitimate calls for a decided improvement in the work of the machine and tractor repair shops. It is time these shops became regular establishments working all year round, not confined to seasonal jobs. It has been justly pointed out before the Congress, and in the speech delivered here by Comrade Benedictov, People's Commissar of Agriculture, that there is a definite need for improvement in the organization of land development. To accelerate the introduction of proper systems of crop rotation, this matter must be taken well in hand by the state and financed from the state budget.
Lastly, the question of the collective farms.
During the pre-Congress discussion the opinion was expressed that we should now set about organizing model communes. A suitable reply was given to the sponsor of this proposal, indicating that he was on the wrong track. The agricultural artel will still be our main form of collective-farm husbandry in the period of the Third FiveYear Plan. We are still far from using the full potential strength of this form of collective farming for the advancement of agriculture, for the promotion of the prosperity of the collective-farm peasantry. Hence, to stress communes at the present time or, worse still, to shift the centre of gravity from the agricultural artel to the commune, would be an error of policy and lead us astray. To clear up the confusion on this score caused in some people's minds by the fact that a new era has begun, an era of gradual transition from socialism to communism, it would be as well to state emphatically that the artel* is still to be the principal form of the collective-farm movement.
But it is a different matter to declare that the artels must undertake a number of new tasks, such as that of further consolidating the collective farms and collective-farm property, and of putting an end to the present distortions and breaches of the Rules of the Agricultural Artel with regard to the subsidiary establishments of the collective farmers. We must see to it that the collective farmer's interest in his subsidiary husbandry does not conflict with his main duty: to strengthen his collective farm .and collective-farm property. The dimensions of the subsidiary plots of the collective farmers and the number of cattle owned individually by them must not exceed the 167 maximum allowed. Everything must be done to promote the further organizational and linahcial consolidation of the collective farms, as it is only along the line of the further organizational and financial strengthening of the collective farms that any real advancement of agriculture and any really rapid improvement in the prosperity and cultural standards of the collective-farm peasantry are possible.
We must also intensify our efforts to improve discipline on the collective farms, as well as the educational work among the collective farmers in this direction.
Lastly, we must make wider use of the team system in collective farming. I have already dealt with these questions in my report. The theses for the Third Five-Year Plan must be amended accordingly.
As regards transport, not much is left for me to say. Comrade Kaganovich dwelt at.length on the tasks that confront railway transportation, and particularly on the need for a considerable reinforcement of its plant and equipment. These tasks must be fully indicated in the Third Five-Year Plan. In reply to a note that has been passed up to me I must say that the construction of a new railway through the Caucasus Mountains is not of sufficient urgency to warrant inclusion in the Third Five-Year Plan. Our task now is to complete as soon as possible the construction of the Black Sea Railway, which will facilitate and expedite communications between Transcaucasia, the North Caucasus and the central districts. As regards the Kirov Railway, I must confirm that a second track will be laid from Murmansk to Soroka station. Furthermore, a new line will be run transversely from Soroka to Plesetskaya to unite the two northern lines--- the Kirov Railway and the Northern Railway. This will improve communication between the north and the central districts, and will facilitate the better exploitation of the forests and other natural resources in the northern part of our European territory.
As regards motor transport. Proposals have been made on all hands, and rightly so, that we pay serious attention to the development of motor transport. Now that we are beginning to have a fair number of automobiles, 1,700,000 being the estimated total at the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period, the question of how to make the best use of motor transport acquires great importance. Here, too, with better organization of work and the elimination of the present all-too-common inefficiency in motor transport management, much can be done to promote our economic development. The general question of increasing state control of motor transport is to be specially discussed in the Economic Council in the near future.
168Many people have spoken on the need for an improvement in the manufacture of building materials. As you know, a special People's Commissariat has been formed for this purpose. A change in the structure of the building organizations has also been advocated. The problem voiced in the proposal made here by Comrade Popkov of Leningrad to put all housing construction in Leningrad under the jurisdiction of the Leningrad Soviet can hardly be decided in this simple way. But this proposal contains a grain of wisdom in that it sponsors the formation of large territorial organizations for housing construction, to the exclusion of the small departmental trusts now existing. When we form a People's •Commissariat of the Building Industry---and we are on the way to it---we can be certain of a complete change in this direction, namely, the formation of substantial territorial building organizations.
In the pre-Congress discussion serious attention was given to such questions as the training of forces for our national economy, the training of new professional personnel, the work of our research institutes, and the progress of technology and scientific research. The tasks with which our Party is confronted in regard to our socialist intelligentsia require that all these questions be viewed from a much broader angle than has been the case hitherto. We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that we still have quite a number of problems to solve in the field of science, a field in which the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R. should by rights play the leading role and set the right tone both in the theoretical work of developing Soviet science, progressive as it is, and in the practical work of coordinating the creative efforts of our scientists with the whole planned development of our national economy in the Third Five-Year Plan period. ' But now we can hope for much better results in this field than ever before, and this is a matter of the highest importance to the country's economic life.
In my report I dwelt on the following problems of a more general character which involve questions of principle, and which were discussed publicly prior to the Congress: The question of eliminating the contrast between town and country, the prospects of eliminating the contrast between brain work and manual labour, and also, briefly, the questions concerning the further development of the collective farms, on which I have just made some additional comments.
In the pre-Congress discussion some people expressed the opinion that the reference in the theses to the fact that the U.S.S.R. is economically still behind the leading capitalist countries might give people 169 a wrong idea about the Soviet Union. They argued that this reference to the inadequate economic level of the U.S.S.R. does not tally with the steady improvement in the condition of the Soviet people, particularly in view of the fact that the condition of the masses, even in the economically most developed capitalist countries, is going from bad to worse under the stress of crises, unemployment and rural distress. It must be said in reply that the theses indicate with sufficient clarity the rapid rise in the general prosperity of the U.S.S.R. and the further great advance in its general prosperity envisaged by the Third Five-Year Plan, the more so when considered in connection with the measures outlined for the further advancement of the economic level of our country. But it should be clear to us all that while indicating these points in our favour, we must by no means shut our eyes to the fact that the economic level we have achieved so far is not adequate. We must not shut our eyes to the fact that, while we have surpassed the capitalist countries both in rate of industrial development and in technical level of production, we have yet to overtake the most highly developed capitalist countries in a number of major industries with regard to output per head of population. In view of the immensity of our population it will take us considerable time and much effort to cover this ground- But we -will cope with this task, too, in a short stretch of time, if we do not close our eyes to our shortcomings, if we are able, in Bolshevik fashion, to fire the ambition of our Party members and of all honest citizens of our country to solve the main economic task of the U.S.S.R. with the utmost despatch.
After Comrade Stalin's report and the further development of Marxist-Leninist theory given in his profoundly scientific analysis of the question of the state and the intelligentsia, there is no need to dwell on other general questions of principle. The Party now has all its work, the solution of all its problems, in clear perspective.
All the speakers here have spoken of advances in particular branches of our national economy, in particular economic districts and republics of the U.S.S.R., and of the advance in the economic development of the country as a whole. And, indeed, steady economic, cultural and political advance in all branches and all economic districts has become a permanent feature of our , country. This advance is expressed in the political, economic and cultural progress of all our republics and of the U.S.S.R. as a whole. The Third Five-Year Plan must play a great organizational role in this advance, and in the further growth of the economic strength of the whole multi-national Soviet Union.
170Our task is to mobilize all our forces in a Bolshevik manner for the fulfilment of the Third Five-Year Plan. One year, the first year of the 'Third Five-Year Plan period, has already elapsed. Last year we attained no little progress in our industrial development. Last year our industrial output increased by 11 per cent in comparison with the preceding year. But we must secure higher rates of industrial develop; ment if we are to fulfil our plan for the Third Five-Year Plan period. The increase for 1939 has been fixed at 20 per cent. As you see, an ambitious plan and no light task. So we have no time to lose. The Eighteenth Congress of the Party has evoked great enthusiasm among the masses of the workers. It has served to accelerate the rate of output of our industries. It is not in all branches of industry that we are completely fulfilling the plan for this year, but a number of industries, a number of towns and districts, are already successfully coping with their tasks. The enthusiasm with which the working class ushered in our Congress had marked results already in Februa.ry, and it is our duty to consolidate the ground thus gained. We must do everything to secure good plan fulfilment in 1939, so that it may be instrumental in fulfilling the whole Third Five-Year Plan. (Applause.)
We must work in such a way that, after the First Stalinist FiveYear Plan so gloriously fulfilled ahead of schedule, and after the Second Stalinist Five-Year Plan, which we completed with equal success, we shall be able to say with pride: we have fought like Bolsheviks to fulfil and exceed the Third Five-Year Plan, we have secured a new Bolshevik victory. And then the Third Five-Year Plan will indeed be what we intend it to be---a new Stalinist Five-Year Plan of victory in the struggle for the mighty development of the forces of the U.S.S.R. (Loud and prolonged applause. All rise. Loud cheers.)
[171] ~ [172]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
A. ZHDANOV
Comrades, in his report to the Eighteenth Congress, Comrade Stalin summed up the magnificent socialist victories achieved by our Party in the period of the Second Five-Year Plan. He made an exceedingly profound and sagacious analysis of the circumstances of our victories and outlined a great program of work connected with the gradual 'transition of the U.S.S.R. from socialism to communism.
The victory of socialism is a triumph for our Party, a triumph for its Leninist-Stalinist leadership.
It is a victory for the policy of the Party, for its theory, its ideology and its organizational principles.
The millions of working people of our country have rallied around our Party. Its ideas, the ideas of communism, have become the banner of the Soviet people.
In order to accomplish the historic tasks involved in the building of socialism, and in order to protect the gains of victorious socialism from the surrounding capitalist world and its agents inside the UlS.S.R., the Party had to effect a radical readjustment of its political and organizational work.
By purging its ranks of the enemy scum and thus consolidating the Bolshevik unity and firmness of its ranks, and by readjusting its political and organizational work, the Party immensely enhanced its strength and power and its ideological and organizational armament.
The Party is now stronger than ever before!
And this we owe to the leadership of Comrade Stalin! (Stormy applause and cheers. All rise.)
The source of our Party's strength, the source of its epoch-making victories lies in the fact that it is a party of a new type, the LeninistStalinist type, a party which is irreconcilable towards opportunists and towards all enemies of the working class. Our Party is the party of social revolution; it has grown up on the firm foundation of the 175 theory of Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin. Its program, tactics and organizational principles are based on the granite foundation of MarxismLeninism. In its ranks are the finest representatives of the working class, the most devoted of its sons, the most class-conscious, revolutionary, courageous and disciplined. Thanks to this, the Bolshevik Party has become the militant staff of the working class, its revolutionary vanguard, a Party
``... bold enough to lead the proletarians in the struggle for power, experienced enough to find its bearings amidst the complex conditions of a revolutionary situation, and flexible enough to steer clear of all submerged rocks in the path to its goal." (Stalin, Leninism.)
The Bolshevik Party performs its role of vanguard of the working class not only through its consistent revolutionary and scientific program and tactics, but also through its organization. A distinguishing feature of our Party is that it has attributed exclusive importance to organization at every stage of its revolutionary activities. It has been relentless towards opportunism in matters of organization and has always devised organizational forms, and rules and laws for the government of its internal life that corresponded to the historical conditions of the Party's activities and ensured the performance of its political tasks.
The organizational principles of Bolshevism are an instrument for the carrying out of a consistently revolutionary program and tactics, for a revolutionary program cannot be carried out without a firm, centralized organization. The Leninist-Stalinist organizational principles of Party structure have been embodied in the Party Rules, which define the methods of practical activity of the Party organizations, the forms of the Party's structure and the rules governing its internal life. The historic mission of our Party, as the organizer and leader of the socialist revolution and of the realization of the dictatorship of the working class determined the basic principles of its organizational structure, namely: strict centralism in the activities of the Party organizations; a conscious inner discipline; unity of purpose and unity of action; prohibition of factions and groupings; careful selection of new members of the Party; protection of the Party from the penetration of opportunist petty-bourgeois elements into its ranks; constant care to increase the activity of Party members and to develop innerparty democracy. These principles, which are embodied in the Party Rules, constitute the unshakable foundation of the Party.
176The Party has always regarded its Rules as the inviolable basis of Party life and Party structure. It has always fought for the strict observance of all the provisions of the Rules. Knowing the tremendous power contained in the Bolshevik principles of organization and in their concentrated expression---the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.)---bourgeois henchmen and double-dealers of every kind have time and again used the great name of Party member as a screen in their attempts to undermine the Party Rules, to destroy the unity of the Party and to weaken it, with the object of paving the way for the restoration of capitalism in the U.S.S.R. The events of the past few years have shown what wide use the vile enemies of the people---the Trotsky-Bukharin and bourgeois-nationalist agents of fascism, spies and diversionists---made of violations of Party Rules for their own subversive ends. These violations---departures from the principles of democratic centralism, wholesale admissions into the Party, chaos in the conduct of Party business, etc.---were due to a blunting of Bolshevik vigilance and forgetfulness of the organizational principles of our Party. That is why departures from the Party Rules, violation^ of their provisions and laws, are a violation of the Leninist-Stalinist doctrine of the Party and injurious to the Party.
The Party of revolutionary Marxism determines the organizational forms and methods of its work in conformity with the concrete conditions. On these grounds, the Bolshevik Party has never converted the established forms of Party structure into a dogma, into a lifeless stereotype. As in the development of Marxist theory, so in the organizational fonms laid down in its Rules, our Party bases itself on creative Marxism and enriches these organizational forms with new experience as the conditions of the class struggle develop and new political tasks arise.
Allow me to remind you of the. following precepts laid -down on this subject by the Tenth Party Congress in its resolution on "Party Affairs":
``1. The party of revolutionary Marxism utterly rejects the quest for an absolutely correct form of party organization and methods of work suited to all stages of the revolutionary process. On the contrary, the form of organization and the methods of work must be entirely determined by the specific features of the given concrete historical situation and by the tasks directly arising from this situation.
``2. From this standpoint it is clear that, with a change in the objective conditions of the development of the revolution, any __PRINTERS_P_177_COMMENT__ 12-263 177 organizational form, and the methods of work corresponding to it, may become converted from forms of development of the Party into a fetter on its development; and, vice versa, an organizational f orm which has grown unsuitable may again become an essential, and the only expedient, form should there be a recurrence of the corresponding objective conditions.
``3. The contradiction between the requirements of a newly arising situation, on the one hand, and the established form of an organization and its methods of work, on the other, generally become evident before the necessity for a change of line is definitely felt. The line should be changed only when the task that gave rise to the preceding type of organization and the corresponding method of work has in general---on the whole and in the main---been accomplished.''
There have been numerous instances of changes in the forms and methods of organizational activity in the history of our Party. While holding its basic and fundamental organizational principles inviolate, the Party has always established such organizational forms as facilitate the development of the content of its work, ensure the performance of its political tasks, the unity of word and deed. On this basis, the Party has repeatedly altered its Rules in conformity with changes in the situation, new tasks and the experience gained in its work. It is not by chance that big changes and turns in the political life of the country and the rise of new political tasks for our Party have been accompanied by changes in the Party Rules. I would remind you that the principal amendments to the Party Rules were made in 1922---the period of development of the New Economic Policy; in 1925---when the Party, at its Fourteenth Congress, faced the task of socialist industrialization; and in 1934---the period of the Seventeenth Party Congress, when the Party proceeded 'to tackle the historic tasks of the Second Five-Year Plan.
Questions of party work and party structure have acquired particular significance during the past few years. The tremendous scope of the socialist transformations, the swift rate at which the Party and state are developing, and the enlistment of the millions of Soviet people in the work of socialist construction increase the demands on the Party and on its leadership.
The enhanced importance of the question of organization denotes an enhancement of the role of the vanguard of the working class, which our Party is.
178At the Seventeenth Party Congress, questions of organization, of bringing organizational work into conformity with the demands of the political line, were dealt with in their full scope in the report of Comrade Stalin, the report of Comrade Kaganovich and the resolutions of the Congress.
The role of vanguard of the working class, of the advanced detachment of the working people, such as our Party is, becomes all the greater with the victory of socialism, when the U.S.S.R. has entered a new phase of development---the phase of completion of the building of classless, socialist society and of gradual transition from socialism to communism.
The past few years have been a period in which the Party has constantly armed itself and sharpened its organizational weapon. Whereas Lenin, in his remarkable work One Step Forward, Two Steps Back, developed the organizational precepts which later became the organizational principles of the party of the new type, the Bolshevik Party, Comrade Stalin---both as regards theory, ideology and tactics, and as regards placing our whole organizational work on a scientific footing---has developed still further the organizational principles of Lenin's doctrine of the Party, has supplemented the doctrine of the Party on organization by new precepts and new laws, and has advanced, the Bolshevik science of organization, thus arming the Party and the working class for the accomplishment of the historic task of building socialism in our country. (Applause.)
Here I would only like to stress the tremendous importance of the interval between the Seventeenth Congress and the Eighteenth Congress of the .Party as regards the enrichment of the latter's organizational experience.
Comrade Stalin has given the Party brilliant examples of creative Marxism on the subject of the organizational structure of the Party. I refer to the doctrine of the interrelation between the political line and organizational work; regarding the scientific organization of the selection, training, promotion and allocation of cadres; regarding the Bolshevik organization of the work of keeping a check on the fufilment of decisions; regarding the Party's methods of combating enemies who have penetrated its ranks, and its methods of purging its ranks of degenerates and double-dealers; and regarding vigilance and the mastering of Bolshevism.
On all these questions Comrade Stalin has armed the Party with wise and farsighted precepts which constitute a most valuable __PRINTERS_P_179_COMMENT__ 12* 179 contribution to the treasure-store of the Bolshevik theory of organization and a guide to action.
Why is it necessary to amend the Rules of the C.P.S.UJB.)^^1^^?
The Eighteenth Party Congress has met at a time when fundamental changes have taken place in the economic life and class structure of the U.S.S.R.
There is no need for me to dwell in detail on these questions as they have been treated with exhaustive fulness and clarity in the reports of Comrade Stalin and Comrade Molotov.
The victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. has ensured the dominance of the socialist economic system. The class composition of the U.S.S.R. has changed in conformity with the profound changes in the economic sphere. All exploiting elements---capitalists, merchants, kulaks and profiteers---have been eliminated in the period of socialist construction. The working people of the U.S.S.R.---the workers, peasants and intellectuals---have undergone profound change in the period of socialist construction.
The class boundaries dividing the working people are being obliterated; the economic and political contradictions between workers, peasants and intellectuals are disappearing---becoming obliterated. It is this that has formed the basis for the moral and political unity of Soviet society. This moral and political unity of Soviet society has been brilliantly confirmed in the creation and complete victory of the Communist and non-Party bloc in the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. and the Supreme Soviets of the Union Republics.
A numerous body of non-Party Bolsheviks has grown up around the Party, consisting of advanced workers, peasants and intellectuals, active and conscious fighters in the cause of the Party and vehicles of its policy among the masses.
In view of these fundamental changes in the economic and class structure of the U.S.S.R. the time is ripe to amend the conditions of admission to the Party laid down in the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.).
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Abolition of the Categories of Admission to the PartyThe existing system, as prescribed in the Party Rules, of admitting new members into the Party in accordance with four different categories, depending upon the social status of the applicant, is obviously incompatible with the changes in the class structure of Soviet society resulting from the victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. The need for 180 different categories of admission of new members and of varying probationary periods has disappeared..
The different categories of admission, depending upon the social status of the applicants for Party membership, were established, as you know, at the Eleventh Party Congress in 1922, at the beginning of the New Economic Policy, with the object of making it difficult for non-proletarian elements to enter our Party. The situation at that time was entirely different from what it is now. At that time the proletariat was in part declassed. The peasants farmed individually. The exploiting classes had not yet been fully abolished. The New Economic Policy was exercising a demoralizing influence on a section of the Party members, especially its non-proletarian elements. Under those conditions, if the Party was to exercise its role offranguard with success, such a barrier to the penetration of unstable, petty-bourgeois elements into its ranks as the establishment of different categories of admission was essential. It played a big part in strengthening our Party and in helping it to perform its historical mission.
However, in view of the victory of socialism in our country, the need for these restrictions has disappeared. These restrictions are already hindering and hampering the reinforcement of the ranks of the Party with advanced workers, peasants and intellectuals devoted to the cause of the working class. The Party can no longer adhere to its old framework, to its old standards. The need for the different categories of admission has disappeared.
To what incongruities and anomalies the existing system of admission into the Party leads in practice may be illustrated by numerous examples to be found in any Party organization.
Our best Stakhanovites, once they become foremen or directors, that is, have been promoted to executive posts because of their abilities and services, find themselves, when applying to join the Party, in the position of second-rate people.
The worker, or son of a worker, who has received an education is classed in the fourth category when applying for admission to the Party.
Take, for example, Comrade Smetanin, one of the finest Stakhanovites in Leningrad, a former laster in the Skorokhod Shoe Factory and now Assistant People's Commissar of Light Industry of the U.S.S.R. As one of the finest Stakhanovites, he was promoted to shop superintendent, and as shop superintendent he was admitted to the Party as a candidate member under the second category. Then, because of his Cervices and capabilities, he was appointed director of the factory, 181 and when, in February 1939, the question arose of transferring him from candidate membership to full membership, he was obliged to enter the Party under the fourth category.
Here is a man who advances and develops, yet the conditions of his admission into the Party become more complex and difficult. Comrade Smetanin, and all comrades in his position, are perplexed why admission to the Party should be made more difficult as they advance. Comrade Smetanin protested, and quite rightly. "Did I become worse," he asked, "when I was promoted from worker to shop superintendent? Did I become worse when they made me director of the factory? Why should I now have to find a larger number of 'recommenders,' with a longer Party standing, than when I was an ordinary worker?''
Or take the case of Comrade Kartashev, who spoke here bringing greetings to the Congress from Leningrad. Not a bad worker, one would think, and it was not a bad speech he made. He came to the fore as a non-Party agitator during the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. Comrade Kartashev is a fitter by trade; he was a Stakhanovite, and he has now been promoted along the lines of the Engineers and Technicians Organization. When he applied for membership in the Party he was admitted under the second category. What is the sense of this? One might think the Party has to ``protect'' itself from men like Kartashev.
Here is another example which was cited at a conference of the Stalin District of the Stalingrad Region. Comrade Mussin, a first-class worker, who was promoted to an executive post, went back to work in the shop in order to be admitted into the Party under the first category.
Such examples could be quoted by the thousand. They give rise to a legitimate feeling of perplexity and sense of injury in comrades whose only crime is that they have been promoted. All this shows that the existing requirements of admission are antiquated and have begun to act as a hindrance to really advanced workers, peasants and intellectuals joining the Party.
You know what the practice of admission under various categories led to; people began to rack their brains trying to decide under what category to class a mechanic, foreman, and so on. Regular "rate cards" were devised to show under what category various professions should be classed. But whichever way you turn, whatever "rate cards" you devise, one thing is clear---the requirements are antiquated, they have ceased to answer the purpose for which they were introduced. These 182 requirements of the Rules are out-of-date; they are a cracked mould, as the foundrymen say. ( Laughter.)
These antiquated requirements are clung to by retrograde people who are not anxious for the advancement of new and young forces.
The antiquated standards furnish a pretext for the cultivation of retrograde, essentially anti-Marxist, anti-Leninist tendencies with regard to the new. Soviet intelligentsia, with regard to foremost people of the working class and the peasantry; they furnish a pretext for the cultivation of an attitude of disdain towards advanced people who because of their education or services have been promoted to leading posts.
All this goes to show that a form which was once essential has now become antiquated, a form without content. A thing of value has been transformed into its own antithesis, into a defect. The organizational form should correspond .with the content; and our content will proceed along the line of bringing the classes closer together and abolishing class distinctions.
Accordingly, the theses submitted to the Congress propose to amend the existing system of admission of new members to the Party under different categories and to establish uniform conditions of admission and a uniform period of probation, irrespective of whether the applicants belong to the working class, the peasantry or the intelligentsia.
The amendments to the conditions of admission proposed in the theses are a direct result of the victory of socialism.
The theses propose to establish a one-year probationary period as candidate members for all persons joining the Party. This period is quite sufficient to enable the candidate member to become thoroughly acquainted with the rules, program and tactics of the Party and to enable the Party organization to test the personal qualities of the candidate member.
It must not be forgotten that it is the foremost people, people who have been tested in various sectors of the fight for socialism, who are now joining our Party.
As you know, admission to the Party was at one time suspended. It was not resumed until November 1, 1936. It is the active body of people that grew up around the Party when admission to its ranks was suspended who constitute the principal source of the present influx of new members into the Party.
The existing system of probationary membership suffers from very serious defects. The most serious is that the work of many Party organizations in educating candidate members is absolutely unsatisthe result being what is known as "eternal probationers," 183 people who remain candidate members for six, seven or eight years, and more. (Animation and laughter.) Instead, of the body of candidate members serving as a living reservoir from which the Party constantly draws fresh reinforcements, it has, in the case of many organizations, become a sort of "permanent reserve.''
Latferly, just before the Congress, the Party organizations have shown some improvement in the matter of advancing candidate members to full membership. But even so, there are still quite a number of candidate members whose probationary period has lasted many ''•years. And if we bear in mind that in the sympathizers' groups, too, ' there are people who have been waiting for years to be accepted as candidate members, the question arises, when will they be admitted into the Party? Some four years in the sympathizers' groups, another seven or eight years as candidate members^---when will they become full-fledged members of the Party? (Animation.) There is no need to show that this obnoxious practice arises from that formal and bureaucratic attitude to people, to Party members, which the Party has condemned.
The purpose of the proposal to establish a one-year probation period is to put a stop to this obnoxious practice and to compel Party organizations to get busy, to improve educational and organizational work among candidate members and to make the probation period something more than a mere formality.
According to the theses, all persons wishing to join the Party must obtain recommendations from three Party members who have been in the. Party for at least three years and who know the applicants from having worked together with them for not less than one year.
This proposal springs from what Comrade Lenin proposed in a note to Comrade Molotov on September 15, 1921, in which he said:
``Recommendations may be given only by those who have personally observed the work of the person recommended for a period of not less than one year from having worked with him in one or another Party organization.''
This proposal should increase the responsibility of the recommender for the person he recommends.
As to the number of recommenders and their period of membership, the formulation proposed in the theses has the object of enabling members who have joined the Party in the last few years to give recommendations. This proposal is undoubtedly timely and advisable.
The ranks of the Party have been reinforced by active and 184 advanced people who have received a solid political education. It would be wrong to deprive these new Party members of the right to give recomlmendations.
Comrades, the existing system of different categories in the matter of recommendations has, as you know, created unnecessary difficulties and excessive obstacles.
You know that it is no easy matter to obtain recommendations, especially in the case of persons who join the Party under the fourth category. A man sometimes wears himself out trying to find the requisite number of recommendations. (Animation.)
The new system with regard to recommendations proposed in the theses would remove these restrictive and unnecessary obstacles.
The new conditions of admission into the Party provide that district committees, or city committees in towns with no district divisions, are to be the final instance to confirm the decision of a primary Party organization to admit a new member. This will place a great responsibility on our district committees and city committees for the selection and admission into the Party of really the best members among the working class, the collective farm peasantry and the intelligentsia.
The new system will facilitate the selection of the best people for the Party; it will facilitate the creation of full-blooded Party organizations, especially in the rural localities, where the number of Party organizations is particularly inadequate. There are no primary Party organizations in a large number of collective farms. The formation of strong Party organizations in the rural localities will be of great value in improving Party work in the collective farms and state farms.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Rights of Party MembersThe next proposal for the amendment of the Rules is to add to the section on Party members and their duties a clause on the rights of Party members, rights which are taken for granted but are not mentioned in the Rules.
The theses provide that the Rules should specify the following rights of Party members:
a) The right of Party members to criticize any Party worker at Party meetings;
b) The right of Party members to elect and be elected to Party organs;
185c) The right of Party members to demand to be present on all occasions when decisions are adopted regarding their activities or conduct;
d) The right of Party members to address any question or statement to any Party body up to and including the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.).
The inclusion in the Rules of these additions regarding the rights of Party members will have a tremendous effect in increasing the activity of Party members, in heightening the responsibility of Party members for the cause of the Party, and in protecting Party members from bureaucracy.
Experience has shown that in practice the rights of Party members are often violated. There have been frequent cases of bureaucratic and hostile elements hounding and persecuting members for criticism and self-criticism. There have been frequent cases of decisions concerning the activities or conduct of Party members being adopted in their -absence.
We know of quite a number of cases of hostile and bureaucratic elements forbidding Party members to address certain given statements to the higher Party bodies. Hostile elements widely cultivated the practice of setting official discipline up against and higher than Party discipline, thus demoralizing honest Party members.
The theses proceed from the premise that there is no higher discipline than Party discipline.
There have also been cases of infringement of the rights of Party members to elect and be elected.
You all remember the explanation given by the Central Committee prior to the elections of Party bodies last year in correction of the false practice of not allowing comrades who had already been transferred from candidate membership to full membership, but had not yet Deceived their Party cards, to take part in the election of Party bodies.
In order to illustrate the infringement of the rights of Party members that have taken place in practice, I will cite a few examples.
Comrade Sedenkov is employed in the Barricade Works in Stalingrad; he has been a member of the C.P.S.U. (B.) since 1924, and has been a worker for twenty-eight years. He repeatedly pointed to defects in the work of his shop, but the shop management and the social organizations would not listen to him. Comrade Sedenkov then decided to send a statement to the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) describing certain shortcomings in the work of his shop. He handed 186 this statement to the secretary of the shop Party organization to be transmitted to the Central Committee. Instead of complying with the request of the Party member and transmitting the letter, the bureau of the shop nucleus preferred to discuss Comrade Sedenkov's ``offence'' and compelled him to admit that he had made a mistake in writing to the Central Committee and to promise not to commit such `` mistakes'' in future. And so the letter was never sent to the Central Committee. During the verification of Party records this incident was recalled and the Party organization of the works expelled Comrade Sedenkov from the Party for "instability." (Animation.)
On January 9, 1936, the Stalingrad Regional Committee endorsed the expulsion of Comrade Sedenkov. He had been so intimidated by the local Party organizations that when appealing to the Party Control Commission in 1937 he again wrote repenting his ``mistakes''---so ``convincing'' had been the influence brought to bear on him. The Party Collegium of the Party Control Commission reinstated Comrade Sedenkov in the Party.
There was a similar case with regard to Comrade Tolstikov, direc.tor of the Ikoretsk Machine and Tractor Station, Liskinsk District, Voronezh Region. Comrade Tolstikov sent a letter to Comrades Stalin and Molotov complaining that he was being unjustly persecuted by the secretaries of his district committee, who were themselves guilty of distortions of policy with regard to grain deliveries.
An investigation made on the spot by representatives of the Party Control Commission fully confirmed Comrade Tolstikov's statement, and the secretaries of the district committee were exposed as enemies of the people. But even after they were arrested, the district committee continued to persecute Comrade Tolstikov and secured his expulsion from the Party and even his arrest.
He lodged numerous complaints with the Voronezh Regional Committee of the Party, but they received no attention for three months, despite repeated reminders from the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.). Only when the Party Control Commission again intervened, in August 1938, was Comrade Tolstikov fully rehabilitated and penalties imposed on those guilty of persecution and tyranny.
There are frequent violations of the right of Party members to be present on all occasions when their activities or conduct are being examined. Unfortunately, expulsions of members in their absence is no rare thing in many Party organizations.
Mention of the rights of Party members in the Rules will also be 187 of great value in respect to the observance of one of the most important precepts of Leninism, namely, that we must not only teach the masses, but learn from the masses.
At the Plenum of the Central Committee held in FebruaryMarch 1937, Comrade Stalin said:
``Our experience alone, the experience of the leaders, is far from enough. ... In order to lead properly the experience of the leaders must be supplemented by the experience of the Party membership, the experience of the working class, the experience of the working people, the experience of the so-called 'little people.' "
This means that we must not weaken, still less sever, our connections with the masses even for a single minute.
Hence the necessity for a special clause in the Rules on the right of Party members to address any question or statement to any Party body, up to and including the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.). State and Party questions of major importance, facts of exclusive value in the disclosure of abnormalities in Party or Soviet organizations, frequently come to light just as the result of statements made by "little people.''
It has been repeatedly pointed out by Lenin and Stalin that a bureaucrat with a Party card in his pocket is the most dangerous and pernicious kind of bureaucrat, because, possessing a Party card, he imagines that he may ignore Party and Soviet laws and the needs and interests of the working people.
By inscribing the rights of Party members in the Rules we shall place in the hands of the Party a powerful weapon for combating swell-headedness, bureaucratic self-importance and conceit, and for improving the contacts between leaders and led, and, consequently, for improving the whole work of the Party and the state.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Abolition of Mass PurgesThe theses further propose to abolish mass Party purges. Experience has shown that they now can be, and should be, dispensed with, for the following reasons.
The method of the mass purge, which was introduced at the beginning of the New Economic Policy, when capitalist elements had received a new spurt of life, in order to guard the ranks of the Party 188 from people who had been demoralized owing to the New Economic Policy, has lost its purpose under present conditions when capitalist elements have been eliminated.
The point must be (stressed that mass purges have played a tremendous part in' strengthening the Party. If our party now represents a far more organized force than ever before, if the Party has increased its strength by purifying its ranks of every kind of dross, this is to a large extent due to the mass purges.
However, now; that the capitalist elements have been eliminated, now that Bolshevik order has been introduced in Party affairs, now that the Party has already rid itself of unreliable and dubious elements, the method of the mass purge obviously no longer conforms to the new conditions and no longer achieves its purpose.
The Party can apply the ordinary procedure to rid its ranks of people who violate its program and rules.
The objectionable feature of the mass purges is that, bearing as they do the character of a campaign, they are attended by many mistakes, primarily by the infringement of the Leninist principle of an individual approach to people.
By establishing a definite standard and measuring everybody by one criterion, the method of the mass purge encourages a formal approach and does not permit the full observance of the Party principle that Party members, people, must be treated with careful attention, and in practice it often leads to the infringement of the rights of Party members.
The result of this was that during mass purges there were numerous cases of unwarranted expulsion from the Party, and of hostile, elements Who had wormed their way into the Party taking advantage of the purges to persecute and ruin honest people.
Hence, now that the Party has done so much to purify its ranks, there is no necessity for the method of the mass purge. This is shown by the fact that by far the most impoftant work of purifying the ranks of the Party of enemies of the people, traitors, treason-mongers and fascist agents was performed after the mass purges. And there is good reason for this. The new methods of subversive activities practised by hostile elements who had insinuated themselves into the ranks of the Party were double-dealing, masking their subversive activities by an external show of agreement with the line of the Party, feigning a readiness to fight in support of its decisions. We know that the hostile elements made wide use of noisy displays, sham activity, toadying, creating an atmosphere of flattery, pompous speeches, 189 greetings and so on, in order to deceive and lull the vigilance of certain of our leaders.
Consequently, the method of the mass purge was of very little effect and did not achieve its purpose with regard to hostile elements who had wormed their way into the Party and who masked their true character by double-dealing and deceiving the Party.
It was found that the method of the mass purge was chiefly turned against the so-called passive Party members and led to the expulsion of honest and conscientious members on the alleged grounds of passivity.
During the purge of 1933 the largest group of persons expelled from the Party comprised the so-called passive elements. It was in respect to them that most mistakes were committed by the Party organizations. It frequently happened that honest and devoted people, exemplary workers in their factories, were classed among the passive elements. Under this category were comrades who did not have some trifling and futile assignment of duty, who were tied by large families, or who several times missed attending a study circle, or who failed to answer some brainracking or pigheaded question at a political examination.
There is no need to cite instances of unwarranted expulsions on the ground of passivity. Plenty of them can be found in any organization.
Hence, with the consolidation of the Party, the need for mass purges has disappeared.
At the Plenum of the Central Committee of February-March 1937 and the Plenum of January 1938, the Party condemned the formal and heartlessly bureaucratic attitude to the fate of Party members, to the question of expulsion from the Party and reinstatement in the Party. As we know this was a practice which was made wide use of by careerist elements who had made their way into the Party and who tried to distinguish and advance themselves by expelling people from its ranks, as well as by masked enemies within the Party who endeavoured by the wholesale infliction of penalties to ruin honest Party members and to sow unnecessary suspicion in the Party ranks. Changing his tactics, the enemy fastened on the question of vigilance and made capital out of it, endeavouring under a mask of hypocritical talk about vigilance to victimize as many honest Communists as possible with the object of fostering mutual distrust and disorganizing our ranks.
The slandering of honest people under the guise of "vigilance" 190 is at the present time the most widespread method used to mask and screen hostile activities. If you want to discover still unexposed enemy wasps' nests, look for them above all among the slanderers.
The Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) held in January 1938 adopted a number of measures to put a stop to the practice of wholesale expulsions from the Party and to really ensure a differentiated approach in deciding whether members should be expelled or expelled members reinstated.
The Central Committee based itself on the well-known precept laid down by Comrade Stalin at the Plenum of the Central Committee in February-March 1937:
``... Some of our Party leaders suffer from a lack of concern for people, for members of the Party, for workers. More than that, they do not study members of the Party, do not know what interests they have, how they are developing; generally, they do not know their workers. That is why they have no individual approach to Party members, to Party workers. And because they have no individual approach in appraising Party members and Party workers they usually act in a haphazard way: either they praise them wholesale, without measure, or roundly abuse them, also wholesale and without measure, and expel thousands and tens of thousands of members from the Party. Such leaders generally try to think in tens of thousands, not caring about 'units,' about individual members of the Party, about their fate. They regard the expulsion of thousands and tens of thousands of people from the Party as a mere trifle and console themselves with the thought that our Party has two million members and that the expulsion of tens of thousands cannot in any way affect the Party's position. But only those who are in fact profoundly antiParty can have such an approach to members of the Party.
``As a result of this heartless attitude towards people, towards members of the Party and Party workers, discontent and bitterness is artificially created among a section of the Party, and the Trotskyite double-dealers artfully hook on to such embittered comrades and skilfully drag them into the bog of Trotskyite wrecking.''
Comrades, you have apparently noticed that in the discussion of the theses on amendments to the Rules of the G.P.S.U. (B.) by no means the least attention was paid to the question of measures to prevent the vilification of honest Party members. The Central 191 Committee and Pravda have also received a large number of letters on this subject.
I will cite a few examples of hostile activities under the flag of "vigilance.''
A certain Kalyakaikin was secretary of the district Party committee of Isinsk, Tambov Region. Out of a total of one hundred and seventy-five members of the Party organization, he managed in a short period to have fifty-eight expelled. Kalyakaikin acted as ifollows: when he had somebody expelled he at once raised the question of calling to account before the Party all Communists who had had any relations whatever with the expelled person. He operated on a sort of ``belt'' system. For example, Kalyakaikin had a certain Nazarov expelled from the Party. Nazarov was later arrested at the demand of the district committee. He was under remand for about seven months and was then released by the investigating authorities because the charges brought against him were not proved. But while Nazarov was in custody, his wife and seven other Communists were expelled from the Party for having had connections with him; furthermore, twenty-eight Young Communist Leaguers were expelled from the League and ten teachers, not members of the Party, were dismissed from their posts. In the end, as was to be expected, Kalyakaikin was exposed as an enemy of the people, expelled from the Party and arrested.
In the Archangel Party organization, for example, there was exposed a malicious slanderer by the name of Priluchny, who had filed statements against one hundred .and forty-two Communists, not a single one of which was substantiated.
In Leningrad, an anti-Party group headed by one Napolskaya was active for a long time; this group zealously fabricated compromising material against honest Communists, sent in statements about them to the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs and tried to cause the ruin of honest people. This group calumniated scores of honest people.
Gladkikh, former secretary of the district committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) in Rodvino, Archangel Region, instructed every Communist to discover an enemy of the people, and announced in advance that "there will be no distortion of policy here.''
Peskovskaya, an enemy of the people in the Kluchi district, Aktyubinsk Region, brought about the expulsion from the Party.of one hundred and fifty-six Communists, or sixty-four per cent of the membership of the organization. In the Progress Collective Farm, in 192 this same district, the whole Party organization, consisting of thirteen members, was expelled.
The enemies directed their main efforts to ruining honest Bolshevik cadres. Kudryavtsev, an enemy of the people, who before his exposure held an important post in one of the Ukrainian Party organizations, stated in his testimony as follows:
``We endeavoured to expel as many people from the Party as possible. We expelled people when there were no grounds for expulsion. We had one aim in view---to increase the number of embittered people and thus increase the number of our allies.''
It was also part of the plan of subversive activities of the enemies of the people to destroy the Party apparatus. Here is the testimony of another enemy of the people who had wormed his way by deceit on to one of the regional Party committees in the Ukraine.
``In the course of five or six days I dispersed the apparatus of the regional committee, dismissed nearly every one of the departmental managers of the committee, discharged twelve or fifteen instructors and also took on a new office staff.
``I did all this on the pretence of combating enemies and purging the Regional Committee of the Ukr.C.P. (B.) of people who had lost vigilance. Having `purged' the apparatus of the regional committee, I proceeded to disperse the city committees and district committees on the same pretext. In a very short time I dismissed fifteen secretaries and a large number of other functionaries against whom I had no compromising material whatever. I made a pretence of combating enemies, thus incensing against the Party a number of Communists who had been dismissed by me without any good reason. In addition, I demoted a number of members of our counter-revolutionary organization to lower posts, thus saving them from detection.''
In some organizations the slanderers lost all sense of restraint and simply put their feet on the table.
For example, a slanderer by the name of Khanevsky was exposed in one of the districts of the Kiev Region. Not a single one of the numerous charges brought by Khanevsky against Communists was substantiated. Nevertheless, this calumniator was not in the least perturbed, and in one of his denunciatory epistles to the regional committee of the Ukr.C.P. (B.) he inserted the following request: __PRINTERS_P_193_COMMENT__ 13-263 193 ``I have worn myself out fighting the enemies, and therefore request to be sent to a health resort to rest up." (Loud laughter.)
In line with this was the statement made by one, Nefedov, secretary of the Party committee of the Regional Land Department, at a meeting of the active members of Irkutsk. He divides Party members into three groups. "The first type is the fellow who shows a lot of activity; that means he is worth checking up; you may be certain the trail will lead to the enemy. The second type is the fellow with a 'past,' the fellow (with a load on his mind. He's bound to lag---the load will tell; keep an eye on him, check him up; this trail will also most likely lead to the enemy. And the third type is the man who works because he's got to; there too you can't go wrong---he's an enemy." (Loud laughter.)
A regular "theory," you see.
The ``activities'' of some of the slanderers became so extensive that they found it necessary to introduce a certain amount of " rationalization.''
There is the case of Alexeyev, for example, a member of the Party since 1925, manager of the district Party consultation centre in Irbeiskoye, Krasnoyarsk Territory. He was not much of a worker; he spent all his time writing calumnies against honest Communists and non-Party teachers. His ``business'' was so big that he made a list for himself with several columns: "big enemy"; "little enemy"; "wee enemy"; "tiny enemy." (Loud laughter.) It need hardly be said that he created an absolutely intolerable situation in the district. In the end, he was expelled from the Party as a slanderer.
This Alexeyev made me wonder where I had read of such a type, and I at last recalled Sobakevich in Gogol's Dead Souls. Sobakevich, you know, considered everybody a thief and swindler. When Chichikov admitted to him that the man he liked most in the provincial town was the chief of police, because of his bluntness and simplicity,'Sobakevich nonchalantly remarked:
``A rascal! He'll cheat you, give you away, and then go and dine with you! I know them all: they are all scoundrels, every one of them. A pack of thoroughgoing rascals from top to bottom. All Judases. There's only one decent fellow among them, that's the public prosecutor. But if the truth be told, he is a swine too.'' (Laughter.)
Apparently, some of Sobakevich's great-great-grandchildren are alive to this day, and have even managed here and there to get into the 194 Party. We must get an iron broom and sweep our Party house clean of this garbage. (Loud applause.)
The refusal to be .worried about human beings, the reluctance to investigate the charges brought against a man on their merits, is a malady which still ails a good many leaders of our Party organizations. There are still quite a number of people in our organizations who like to insure themselves and be on the safe side.
Expulsions from the Party on the grounds of ``connections'' with enemies at one time assumed very large proportions, and are still to be met with.
On these grounds honest people were expelled from the Party wholesale, their only fault being that they were brought into contact with enemies of the people by their work---"passed them on the street," so to speak.
This fashionable formula---"connections with enemies of the people"---was made wide use of by anti-Party elements to cause the ruin of honest Communists. It was employed in such a broad and vague sense as to include all sorts of things----ordinary acquaintanceship, contact with enemies at work owing to official duties, actual connections with enemies, and participation in counter-revolutionary activities---without any graduation whatever, all covered by one general formula.
A great many mistakes were made, and are still being made, on these grounds.
Because of such wholesale condemnations on purely formal grounds, real out-and-out enemies of the people, first-class scoundrels, managed to escape justice.
Slanderers are active wherever they are assisted by self-insurers.
Here is an example of self-insurance of this kind. The manager and chief engineer of one of the collieries of the Sverdlovsk Coal Trust gave one of the section chiefs the following character:
``Knows his job. Chronic drinker. Quite capable of drinking with his subordinates. Has recently been fulfilling his program of output. Good organizer. Runs his section well. Does not like big jobs. Thorough conservative and opportunist with regard to output. Tries to get as light a program as possible, to work as little as he can and to earn as much as he can." (Laughter.)
Certain Party members have resorted to the aid of medical institutions in the effort to insure themselves. Here is a medical certificate issued to one of these citizens:
__PRINTERS_P_195_COMMENT__ 13* 195``Owing to his state of health and mind Comrade (so and so)
is not fit to be used as a tool by any class enemy.''``District Psychiatrist,
``October District, City of Kiev (signature).''
(Loud laughter.)
A sort of ``biological'' approach to people, to Piarty members, has become quite a widespread practice. This is a theory by which Communists are judged not by their own deeds, but by the deeds of their relatives, near and distant. An unsound ideology or social preferences in some great-grandmother may spoil the careers of many generations of her descendants. (Laughter.)
Such an attitude is absolutely alien to Marxism. We must proceed from the principle repeatedly enunciated and stressed by Comrade Stalin, namely, that the son is not answerable for his father, and that a Party member must be judged by his own deeds. Unfortunately, it is a widespread practice among us to judge the business and political character of a man not by his own work, but by the character of his relatives and ancestors, near and distant.
It must not be thought that the upholders of this ``theory'' come out into the open. Nevertheless, they steadily work away on the quiet and judge people not by their deeds but by their genealogy.
This ``biological'' approach must be put a stop to. (Loud applause.)
There is quite a breed of people in our ranks whom I would call pseudo-moralists. They see only the bad sides of a Party member and refuse to consider and assess his whole life's career, to learn his merits and demerits. These people regard a man as something set and fixed for all time, as a lifeless and unchangeable pattern.
These people are great inventors of shibboleths and schemes which they apply to individuals to judge whether they are good or bad, whether they fit into the scheme or not. (Laughter.)
These people forget that our whole work of building socialism, our whole educational work, is designed to remould the minds of men. That is what our Party exists for, that is why we strove for and achieved the victory of socialism, that is why we are undertaking the tasks of communist development, namely, to remould people, their ego. If there are some who think that remoulding the minds of men does not apply to Party members, that Communists are born free of all prejudices and absolutely require no re-education, this is nothing but an idealistic and schematic view of people. This way of 196 judging people abstractly, in accordance with a ready-made standard, instead of studying them in all their connections and manifestations, condemns one to passivity, to a pessimistic view of people. This pessimistic view looks back on the past. This way of judging people has nothing in common with Bolshevism!. Its method is profoundly hostile to Bolshevism.
It seems to me that all this is a Menshevik backsliding, a peculiar form of opportunism in relation to living people, which does not try to lead people forward, to correct their defects and to re-educate them, but exaggerates, over-emphasizes their defects and does not perceive the valuable qualities in people which should be developed and encouraged in every way. If you scratch these pseudo-moralists, you will find plenty of hypocrites and humbugs among them. You'll never cook your porridge with a lot of gravediggers like this. (Loud applause.)
At the same time, we must stop the practice of half-hearted rehabilitation of reinstated members. There is a fairly widespread type of Party official who to insure himself, to be on the safe side, "not to run any risks," leaves a tag or taglet attached to a rehabilitated Party member or candidate member: if a man has been expelled, and they then have to reinstate him, they give him a reprimand, though nobody knows why; if he had a reprimand, they put an admonishment in his record---for no reason at all, just as a reminder. (Laughter.)
A definite stop must be put to this practice of half-hearted rehabilitation. If a man deserves to be fully rehabilitated, all penalties should be expunged from his record.
These facts make it clear that the decision of the January Plenum of the Central Committee which spoke of the necessity of completely eradicating masked enemies who have wormed their way into our ranks and who strive to conceal their hostility to the Party under a disguise of hypocritical talk about vigilance, is not yet being carried out by some of the organizations with sufficient vigour.
The method of an individual approach to Party members has not yet been fully restored. Wholesale and unwarranted expulsions from the Party are still practised.
The decision of the January Plenum of the Central Committee was designed to create the maximum guarantees in combating unwarranted expulsions, to completely restore the method of individual approach, to ensure the utmost care in matters concerning the fate of Party members.
197In view of the extreme importance of this question, the Rules should be supplemented by a number of clauses to ensure an attentive approach and careful investigation of accusations brought against Party members, to protect the rights of Party members from all arbitrary procedure and to abolish the resort to expulsion from the Party---which is the supreme Party penalty---for trifling misdemeanours.
We must recall what Comrade Stalin said:
``The Party has become a big and serious thing to Party members, and joining the Party or being expelled from the Party is a crucial event in a man's life.''
``Whether he remains in the Party or is expelled from the Party is a matter of life and death to the ordinary Party member.''
Comrade Stalin says in another place that the supreme P'arty penalty is expulsion from its ranks, just as the supreme penalty in the army is shooting. (See Stalin, On the Opposition.)
The decisions of the Plenum of the Central Committee of February-March 1937, and of the Plenum of the Central Committee of January 1938 on the subject of expulsion from the P'arty resolve themselves to this, that -expulsions from the Party must be reduced to a minimum. If expulsion from the Party is equivalent to the supreme penalty in the army, that is, shooting, it cannot be imposed right and left.
We must restore to their full use the measures of Party punishment laid down in the Party Rules for various offences. You cannot judge all offences in the same way, without discriminating between grave and unimportant. Expulsions from the Party at one time became a sort of small change in many Party organizations, while such measures of Party punishment as caution, rebuke, admonition, reprimand, strict reprimand, and final warning---all that fairly flexible scale of measures of Party influence provided for in our Rules and corresponding to various kinds and degrees of Party offences, was forgotten.
The measures of Party education and influence laid down in the Rules must be restored to their full use.
'A few words must be said on the subject of old penalties which have been withdrawn. Much has been said about this subject too at Party meetings before the Congress. If a man has reformed and the penalty inflicted on him has been withdrawn, there is no need to be constantly recalling it, to exact revenge for old mistakes which 198 have been corrected, to exercise moral repression on the Party member.
There are many cases like the following: a man may have committed an offence ten years ago and received a penalty; then he mends his ways and the penalty is withdrawn. Nevertheless, this penalty is unfailingly brought up every time the man comes under discussion. This does a lot of harm, from the standpoint, for example, of the right to be elected to Party bodies. We know that when candidates are discussed in elections to Party bodies, the nomination of such comrades is often rejected. That is wrong: if a man has mended his ways, why should he go about with a stain on his character all his life? It is.wrong to avenge old faults. ("Hear, hear!")
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Mastering or Accepting the Party ProgramThe theses point to the necessity of abolishing the demand contained in the Rules that new members, on joining the Party, in addition to accepting the program and rules of the Party and going through a specified probationary period as candidate members, must also have mastered the program.
In his report at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) in February-March 1937, Comrade Stalin said:
``In order to master the Party program one must be a real Marxist, a tried and theoretically trained Marxist. I do not know whether we have many members of the Party who have mastered our program, who have become real Marxists, theoretically trained and tried. If we continue further along this path we would have to leave only intellectuals and learned people generally in our Party. Who wants such a Party? We have Lenin's thoroughly tried and tested formula defining a member of the Party. According to this foriMula a member of the Party is one who accepts the program of the Party, pays membership dues and works in one of its organizations. Please note: Lenin's formula does not speak about mastering the program, but about accepting the program. These are two very different things. It is not necessary to prove that Lenin is right here and not our Party comrades who chatter idly about mastering the program. That should be clear. If the Party had proceeded from the assumption that only those comrades who have mastered the program and have become 199 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1939/LSTT487/20100304/299.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2010.03.06) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [*]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ theoretically trained Marxists could be members of the Party it would not have created thousands of Party circles, hundreds of Party schools where the members of the Party are taught Marxism, and where they are assisted to master our program. It is quite clear that if our Party organizes such schools and circles for members of the Party it is because it knows that the members of the Party have not yet mastered the Party program, have not yet become theoretically trained Marxists.''
Mastery of the program implies the ability to explain its underlying principles. Accepting the program means subscribing to its principles, agreeing with it and being ready to defend it. It is clear that by demanding that candidates for membership should master the program, that is, should be able to explain its underlying principles, we frighten people away from the Party. There is no theoretical justification for such a demand, and in practice it has led to an incorrect attitude towards applicants for membership. Many candidate members have hesitated to apply for full membership of the Party from fear of being subjected to a political examination and, what is more, often by ignorant people. This unwarranted demand has .in practice led to violations of the fundamental principles of the Party and created a vagueness and uncertainty about the status of many Party members.
Of course, comrades, this does not mean that a candidate member is forbidden to master the program during his probationary period. What we are talking about is whether there should be such a demand in the Rules. It is quite clear that by demanding that a candidate member shall have mastered the program we frighten people away from the Party.
Acceptance of the program and rules of the Party, payment of membership dues, and work in one of the Party organizations---that is what the Rules demand of a Party member. The tried and tested Leninist-Stalinist definition of a Party member stands in no need of improvement. That is why the demand in the present Party Rules about mastering the program should be abolished.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Inner-Party DemocracyComrades, the turn in the political life of the country brought about by the new Constitution of the U.S.S.R. faced the Party with new tasks. This turn meant the complete democratization of the 200 electoral system, the substitution of universal suffrage for restricted suffrage, equal suffrage for not entirely equal suffrage, direct elections for indirect elections, and secret ballot for open ballot.
The new electoral system was bound to result, and actually did result, in an enhancement of the political activity of the people, in greater control by the masses over the organs of Soviet power, and in the increased responsibility of the organs of Soviet power to the people.
In order to be fully prepared for this turn in the political life of the country, the Party had to be its moving spirit, and the leading role of the Party in the forthcoming elections to the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. and the Supreme Soviets of the Union Republics had to be fully ensured. But this could be done only if the Party organizations themselves became thoroughly democratic in their everyday work, only if they fully observed the principles of democratic centralism in their inner-party life, as the Party Rules demand, only if all the organs of the Party were elected, only if criticism and selfcriticism in the Party developed to the full, only if the responsibility of the Party bodies to the members of the Party were complete, and if the members of the Party themselves became thoroughly active.
At the February-March Plenum of the Central Committee it was established that quite a number of Party organizations were systematically violating the Party Rules and the principles of democratic centralism in their everyday work, substituting co-option for election, voting by lists for voting for individual candidates, and so forth. It was therefore first of all necessary to put a stop to the anti-- democratic practices of Party organizations and to reorganize Party work on the broad lines of inner-party democracy.
What is the essence of Bolshevik inner-party democracy? The essence of Bolshevik inner-party democracy, as Comrade Stalin has repeatedly told us, resolves itself to the independent initiative, the active participation of Party members in" the work of Party leadership. "Inner-party democracy means heightening the activity of the Party membership and strengthening the unity of the Party, strengthening conscious proletarian discipline within the Party"---so Comrade Stalin teaches us.
It was with this purpose in view that the Party put an end to the violations of the principles of democratic centralism which formerly prevailed in the Party, and re-established the system olelecting the leading bodies of Party organizations, as laid down in the^^7^^ Party Rules.
201The Party adopted a number of additional measures to ensure the observance of consistent democracy: it abolished the practice of co-option; it forbade voting by lists in elections of Party bodies and introduced voting for individual candidates; it ensured for all Party members the unlimited right to challenge candidates and criticize them; it introduced the secret ballot in the election of Party bodies; and it made the periodical summoning of city meetings of the Party active, and, in large cities, of district meetings of the Party active, a compulsory rule.
The Rules should reflect these new measures of the Party, for they have been tested in practice and ensure the further development of criticism and self-criticism, increased responsibility of Party bodies to the Party membership, and greater activity of the Party membership, and have thus helped to arm the Party for the successful performance of the new tasks of political leadership.
We know that in the elections to the Supreme Soviets of the U.S.S.R. and the Union Republics, the Party achieved a complete victory for the Communist and non-Party bloc just because Party work was reorganized on the principles of inner-party democracy.
The consistent application of democratic principles has had a fruitful influence on the whole life of the Party organizations. The increased activity and knowledge of Party members and their heightened sense, of responsibility for the cause of the Party were epitomized in the pre-Congress discussion and in the results of the elections to Party bodies, which demonstrated that Party democracy is in full flower. (Applause.) This has stimulated immense new strata of Party members to take an active share in Party life.
During the elections of Party bodies in 1938 criticism of the work of poorly functioning Party bodies assumed wide proportions. This criticism revealed the unsatisfactory state of the work of a large number of committees and organizers of primary Party organizations, of district committees, city committees, regional committees and territorial committees.
Many new people were elected to leading Party bodies in the 1938 elections, a large number of them for the first time. This is the younger generation. In all, 35 per cent of the members of committees of primary Party organizations, 41 j>er cent of the members of district committees, 46 per cent of the members of city committees, and 60 per cent of the members of regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics were elected for the first time.
202Reports received from local Party organizations show that over two million members and candidate members attended the discussion •at Party meetings of the theses for the Eighteenth Party Congress. About one million comrades took part in the discussions at these meetings. (Applause.)
Comrades, our Party has never known a discussion like the one that preceded the Eighteenth Congress. It was marked by unprecedented solidarity and unity of our Party, and an exceptional growth in the activity of Party members.
Everybody who took part in the discussion made some amendment or suggestion to help the Party and to strengthen thb common Party cause.
The results of the discussion bear out that inner-party democracy is in full flower, that there is an unprecedented increase of activity and initiative among Party members.
The work performed by the Party on the basis of the well-known decisions of the Plenum of the Central Committee of February-March 1937, and of the recommendations made to the Party by Comrade Stalin at this plenum, has borne valuable fruit. Every member feels that his contact with the Party and its work has grown stronger; every Party member has come to feel his full value as one who is bound up with the general body of the Party and responsible for the common entity. This is a most important and valuable result of the development of inner-party democracy.
And, secondly, what is no less important and what we must note as a result of the development of the Party in the last few years, is that new relations have taken root between the leaders and the masses; the confidence of the masses in the leaders has increased tremendously, and so has their mutual contact and closeness. The masses have become accustomed to regard the leaders as their emissaries, their own kith and kin, who at the same time are responsible to the Party, to the masses, to the people. That is the second highly valuable result of the work of the Party during the past few years. (Loud applause.)
The conclusion to be drawn is that the new methods of political work of the Party, based on the consistent application of the principles of Bolshevik inner-party democracy, have increased the strength of our Party. The Party is on the way to the complete activization of its membership, and that is an important condition for the performance by the Party as a whole and by each Communist in 203 particular of their vanguard role among the masses, and, consequently, for further victories of socialist construction.
The Party will continue to develop and ensure inner-party democracy as a means of increasing the activity and initiative of Party members and of cleansing the ranks of the Party of inimical dross and scum. (Prolonged applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Selection of Cadres. Checking the Fulfilment ofI shall now deal with the reorganization of the Party apparatus, the selection of cadres and the check on the fulfilment of decisions.
In his report to this Congress, Comrade Stalin gave an exhaustive definition of the importance of cadres and of their proper selection.
``The proper selection of cadres means:
``Firstly, valuing cadres as the gold reserve of the Party and the state, treasuring them, respecting them.
``Secondly, knowing cadres, carefully studying their individual merits and shortcomings, knowing in what post the capacities of a given worker are most likely to develop.
``Thirdly, carefully fostering cadres, helping every promising worker to advance, not grudging time on patiently `bothering' with such workers, and accelerating their development.
``Fourthly, boldly promoting new and young cadres in time, so as not to allow them to stagnate in their old posts and grow stale.
``Fifthly, allocating workers to posts in such a way that each feels he is in the right place, that each may contribute to our common cause the maximum his personal capacities enable him to contribute, and that the general trend of the work of allocating cadres may fully answer to the demands of the political line for the carrying out of which this allocation of cadres is designed.''
Comrade Stalin further indicated what is the task of the Party now with regard to the proper selection of cadres:
``Our task now is to concentrate the work of selecting cadres, from top to bottom, in the hands of one body and to raise it to a proper, scientific, Bolshevik level.
204``This entails putting an end to the division of the work of studying, promoting and selecting cadres among various departments and sectors, and concentrating it in one body.
``This body should be the Cadres Administration of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and a corresponding cadres department in each of the republican, territorial and regional Party organizations.''
From this point of view the existing organization of the Party apparatus has proven inadequate.
In accordance with the Party Rules, industrial-branch departments were set up in the regional committees, territorial committees, Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics and the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) to perform the practical work involved in carrying out Party resolutions and decisions and to keep a check on the way they are fulfilled by Soviet bodies, business organizations and the lower Party organizations. The idea was to concentrate in each industrial-branch department all the work relating to the given branch, namely, Party organizational work, training and allocation of cadres, mass educational work, industrial propaganda, and supervision of the way Party decisions are fulfilled by the appropriate Soviet and business organs and Party organizations.
The defect of the existing organization was that the selection of cadres, which should be directed from one centre---for the selection of cadres necessitates the concentration of the entire experience and knowledge of cadres in one place, that being the art of Bolshevik leadership---was divided up among numerous industrial-branch departments. This resulted in an incorrect utilization of cadres, the absence of uniform methods of studying cadres, and, consequently, in serious defects in the selection of people. The division of the work of selecting cadres among different industrial-branch departments also resulted in artificially pigeon-holing cadres under separate departments, whereas the proper selection of cadres demands skilful and flexible manoeuvring.
Comrades, many of you know from experience how divided and split up the work of selecting cadres is. The regional committees and territorial committees have their industrial departments, Soviet and trading departments, educational and cultural departments, and so forth. These departments fight and contend among themselves for people. This militates against the proper study, selection and promotion of cadres.
205This functional division of the work of selecting cadres makes it impossible to utilize people properly in accordance with their capacities and the demands of the work.
Experience has taught us that such an organization of the Party apparatus does not answer our requirements.
It is this that makes it necessary to create a strong cadre apparatus of the Central Committee---the Cadres Administration---which would be able properly and scientifically, as Comrade Stalin puts it, to perform the job of selecting and allocating cadres, the work of Party organizational leadership being assigned to a special Organization and Instruction Department.
The Central Committee has already adopted certain measures in the last year or two with the object of more and more centralizing in the present Leading Party Organs Department of the Central Committee the work of selecting and promoting leading cadres not only for Party bodies but also for Soviet and business organizations and all People's Commissariats.
This reconstruction of the work of selecting, studying and allocating cadres must be carried out in the spirit of the directions given by Comrade Stalin in his report on the work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) at the Eighteenth Party Congress.
I should like, further, to dwell on one more amendment to the Rules submitted by the Central Committee to the Eighteenth Party Congress. I refer to the proposal to reduce the length of Party membership required of comrades nominated to leading Party posts, such as secretaries of regional committees, city committees, district committees, etc. The Central Committee proposes to amend this clause in the Party Rules and to reduce the required length of Party membership. This proposal arises from the aim of creating suitable conditions for the promotion of new cadres to leading Party posts.
This proposal is of the highest importance from the point of view of principle and practice.
In his report to our Congress, Comrade Stalin gave a brilliant formulation of the task of promoting new cadres:
``The thing is not," he said, "whether to rely on the old cadres or on the new cadres, but to steer for a combination, a union of the old and the young cadres in one common symphony of leadership of the Party and the state.''
That is why we must boldly and in good time promote young cadres to leading posts.
206If was precisely by promoting young cadres to leading posts boldly and in good time that our Party gained one of its most important successes, namely, the promotion to leading state and Party posts of over 500,000 young Bolsheviks, members of the Party and people standing close to the Party.
Mention should be made of the improvement in the quality of our leading cadres. Our Party cadres now include quite a number of people with a higher education, people of culture, knowledge and education.
Some Statistics Regarding Leading Party Cadres
Total
With
higher,
incomplete
higher, or
secondary
education^^1^^
Workers
by social
status
before
appointment
Under
40 years
of age
Prom 31
to 35
years of
age
Party
members
since
1924
Secretaries of regional
committees, territorial
committees and Central
Committees of Communist
Parties of national republics
(68.9%,
(52.6%)
(91%)
(53.2%)
(80.6%)
Secretaries of district
committees, city committees
and area committees . .
10,902
3,116
5,248
10,020
5,649
10,193
(28.6%)
(48.1%)
(92%)
(52.7%)
(93.6%)
Managers of departments
of regional committees,
territorial committees,
and Central Committees
of Communist Parties of
national republics . . .
(64.1%)
(45.3%)
(92%)
(51.6%)
(84.5%)
~^^1^^ The majority of persons with higher education graduated from university or technical college in the years 1934-38.
Whereas several years ago there was a tendency to shrink from promoting educated people and young people to leading Party posts, while the wreckers put a regular str angle-hold on young cadres, not allowing them to rise, it is the most important achievement of the Party that, having rid itself of wreckers, it has been able to clear the way for the advancement of cadres who have grown up in recent years'and to promote them to leading posts. That is a pledge of the strength and invincibility of our Party (Stormy applause.)
__*_*_*__ 207The work of keeping a practical check on the fulfilment of' Party directions has also been unsatisfactory. This function is divided among the various industrial-branch departments. It, too, musj be centralized and the character of the work of the Party Control Commission altered accordingly. The Party's control must be effective, it must prevent mistakes in good time.
Proper control presumes not only keeping a check on the fulfilment of directions, but also testing their correctness and ascertaining whether any of them need to be replaced by others.
Comrade Stalin has repeatedly and insistently explained to us that
``leadership does not just mean writing resolutions and issuing directions. Leadership means keeping a check on the fulfilment of directions; and not only keeping a check on the fulfilment of directions, but verifying the directions themselves, whether they are correct or mistaken. It would be absurd to think that all our directions are correct one hundred per cent. That is not, and cannot be, the case, comrades. Keeping a check on fulfilment precisely means that our workers must test in the fire of practical experience not only the fulfilment of our directions, but the correctness of the directions themselves (my italics---A. Z.). Shortcomings in this respect are shortcomings in our whole work of leadership." (J. Stalin, "The Work of the April Joint Plenum of the Central Committee and the Central Control Commission," 1928.)
Checking up on fulfilment of decisions is a most valuable antidote to stagnation, to the gathering of rust in our work. It is a highly valuable means of preventing the activities of wreckers. Where a proper check is kept on fulfilment, there the wrecker is paralyzed.
It will now be the chief task of the Party Control Commission to improve the work of keeping a check on the fulfilment of Party instructions.
In view of. this, it must be decided that the Party Control Commission shall work under the auspices of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.). In that case it will be unnecessary for the Party Control Commission to be elected directly at Party congresses. The Party Control Commission should be elected at a Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) and function under the guidance and direction of the Central Committee.
208 __ALPHA_LVL2__ Remedying the Theoretical and Political DeficienciesComrade Stalin has given us in his report a very clear and precise formulation of our tasks in the sphere of Party propaganda, in the sphere of the Marxist-Leninist education of our cadres.
He said:
``The work of regulating the composition of the Party and of bringing the leading bodies closer to the activities of the lower bodies may be organized satisfactorily; the work of promoting, selecting and allocating cadres may be organized satisfactorily; but, with all this, if our Party propaganda for some reason or other goes lame, if the Marxist-Leninist training of our cadres begins to languish, if our work of raising the political and theoretical level of these cadres flags, and the cadres themselves cease on account of this to show interest in the prospect of our further progress, cease to understand the truth of our cause and are transformed into narrow plodders with no outlook, blindly and mechanically carrying out instructions from above---then our entire state and Party work must inevitably languish. It must be accepted as an axiom that the higher the political level and the Marxist-Leninist knowledge of tlje workers in any branch of state or Party work, the better and more fruitful will be the work itself, and the more effective the results of the work; and, vice versa, the lower the political level of the workers, and the less they are imbued with the knowledge of Marxism-Leninism, the greater will be the likelihood of disruption and failure in the work, of the workers themselves becoming shallow and deteriorating into paltry plodders, of their degenerating altogether.''
Comrade Stalin pointed out that we possess all the means and opportunities required for training our cadres ideologically and schooling them politically, and that on this nine-tenths of the fulfilment of our practical tasks will depend.
The task of remedying the theoretical and political deficiencies of our Party cadres, of arming our Party members with the theory of Marxism-Leninism and helping them to master Bolshevism demands that the work of Party propaganda and education should be raised to a proper level, in accordance with the decision of the Central Committee "On the Organization of Party Propaganda in __PRINTERS_P_209_COMMENT__ 14---263 209 Connection with the Publication of the History of the C,P.S.U.(B.) Short Course" and with the indications given on this subject by Comrade Stalin in his report at our Congress.
The task of mastering Bolshevism arises directly from the tasks of the present stage of socialist construction.
In order to successfully cope with the principal task of the Third Five-Year Plan, namely, the communist education of the people and the elimination of the survivals of capitalism in the minds of men, in.order to successfully cope with the practical problems of socialist construction, and in order to be properly equipped for the struggle against the surrounding capitalist world and its agents, our cadres must be armed with theory, that is, with a knowledge of the laws of social development and of the political struggle.
The basic defects of Party propaganda are enumerated in the well-known decision of the Central Committee. This decision also indicates the methods of reorganizing Party propaganda in connection with the publication of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)~Short Course.
The reorganization of propaganda work has already begun,. The first steps in this direction show that the publication of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)---Short Course and the decision of the Central Committee have given a mighty impetus to the raising of the entire ideological and political work to a new level. Millions of people have begun to study Marxism-Leninism, the History of the C,P.S.U.(B.)---Short Course. This is an immense achievement for our Party. About twelve million copies have been sold of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)---Short Course in Russian (loud applause) and about two million copies in other languages of the nations of the U.S.S.R. It has been translated into twenty-eight foreign languages and has already been published in over 673,000 copies. It may quite definitely be said that this is the first Marxist book in all the existence of Marxism to have been disseminated so widely. (Applause.)
Party members have begun to study independently. The demand for Marxist-Leninist literature has grown tremendously. The attention of all Party organizations is now focussed on the propaganda of Marxism-Leninism.
A certain amount of experience in new forms of work has already been gained.
Since the decision of the Central Committee the best theoreticians and propagandists in the Party have been enlisted for the oral 210 and printed propaganda of Marxism-Leninism. A body of experienced professional propagandists is being formed.
Before the reorganization of Party propaganda there were over 112,000 propagandists in the Party. It goes without saying that there were quite a number of people among them who were poorly fitted for the job. This number has now been considerably reduced. The Party organizations now select as propagandists people who are really fitted for the work.
The number of study circles has also diminished. For example, before the decision of the Central Committee there were over 9,000 study circles in Moscow and over 5,000 in Leningrad; now there are a little over 500 in Moscow and about 300 in Leningrad.
Independent study has now become the principal method.
Printed propaganda, which is of decisive importance in this work, is being extended.
All this, however, is only the beginning of that development of propaganda work which pur Party is striving for. In this a decisive part will be played by our Bolshevik press. The demand for printed literature has grown enormously and will continue to grow.
We are on the eve of a tremendous development of all forms of propaganda work of our Party. Wide use must be made of such powerful instruments as the cinema, radio and art for propaganda purposes.
In order to be able properly to lead the work of Marxist-Leninist propaganda in Party and state, and to successfully cope with the task of remedying the theoretical and political deficiencies of Party cadres, the Central Committee needs a powerful apparatus of propaganda and agitation, in the shape of a Propaganda and Agitation Administration, in which all the work of printed and oral propaganda and agitation would be centralized.
Ideological schooling fosters in Soviet, people a consciousness of the dignity of the Soviet citizen and confidence in their own strength. More impressively than ever before ring the words of Comrade Stalin that .theory endows practical workers with the power of orientation, with confidence in themselves, with a perspective, with the ability not only to see events but to foresee them.
The reorganization of our Party propaganda work will ensure the flourishing progress of our theoretical work and will even more thoroughly arm our Party ideologically. (Stormy applause.)
__PRINTERS_P_211_COMMENT__ 14* 211 __ALPHA_LVL2__ Reconstruction of the Party Apparatus.Comrades, the theses on amendments to the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.) propose to reorganize the apparatus of the departments both in the Central Committee and in the localities.
Today, the industrial-branch departments do not know what their functions are, properly speaking; they encroach on the functions of the business organizations, compete with them, and this gives rise to a vagueness as to who is responsible for a job, or kills responsibility altogether.
The industrial-branch departments of the Central Committee should be abolished. An exception should be made in the case of the Agricultural Department, in view of the particular importance of controlling and supervising the activities of the Soviet and Party orr ganizations in the sphere of agriculture.
The urgent task now faces the Party of strengthening organization in the collective farms, of guiding their business affairs, and of organizing work in the collective farms, state farms and machine and tractor stations. Comrade Andreyev has spoken very forcibly and convincingly of these tasks at this Congress.
In view of a certain weakness in the work of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture and the People's Commissariat of State Farms, and in view of the fact that agriculture demands the exclusive attention and care of the local Party organizations, the Agricultural Departments of the Central Committee, the territorial committees and the regional committees must be preserved.
The School Department of the Central Committee should also be preserved, in view of the fact that we have no People's Commissariat of Education for the U.S.S.R., and in view of the necessity of controlling the work of public education in all the republics, territories and regions.
The following departments should be set up in the regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties in the national republics: cadres, propaganda and agitation, organization and instruction, and agricultural. All the other industrial-branch departments should be abolished.
The district committees and city committees should have the following departments: cadres, propaganda and agitation, and organization and instruction.
The direction of the propaganda and agitation departments and 212 the cadre departments in the regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics should be entrusted to special secretaries.
Comrades, after what I have already said about our tasks in relation to the selection of cadres and the checking up on fulfilment of decisions, and in relation to propaganda work, I think there is no necessity for me to explain why such a reorganization of the apparatuses of the Central Committee and of the local Party bodies is necessary. The structure of 'the apparatus of the Central Committee and of the local Party organs proposed to the Eighteenth Party Congress will make it possible to strengthen Party leadership of the various branches of our work
__*_*_*__With the rapid progress of the socialist economic system and the rapid political and cultural development of the workers, peasants and intellectuals, the pace of Party and state life has markedly increased. In order to be able to guide state and Party affairs, to react rapidly to new demands as they arise, and to provide timely solutions for new problems, the existing scheme of central organizations of the Party---the Party Congress and the Central Committee---should be supplemented by a new body, namely, the Ail-Union Party Conference. This is rendered all the more necessary by the fact that the long interval between Party congresses limits the possibility of advancing fo leading posts, and especially to the Central Committee, people who have developed in Party work, whereas a conference would provide this opportunity. The time is therefore ripe to supplement the scheme of central Party organizations---Party Congress and Central Committee---by an Ail-Union Party Conference, to be summoned not less than once a year and to consist of representatives of the local organizations; the chief purpose of the All-Union Conference being to discuss urgent problems of Party policy.
The All-Union Party Conference should be invested with the right to replace part of the membership of the Central Committee, that is, to remove such members of the Central Committee as are unable to cope with their duties as members of that body, and to replace them by others, in the number, however, of not more than one-fifth of the membership of the Central Committee elected by the Party Congress. The conference shall replenish the membership of the Central Committee from among the alternate members of that body elected by 213 the Party Congress, and elect in their place a corresponding number of new alternate members.
The decisions of the Conference shall be subject to endorsement by the Central Committee, with the exception of decisions to elect new members and alternate members of the Central Committee. Decisions of Conferences endorsed by the Central Committee shall be binding on all Party organizations. The delegates to the Conference shall be elected at plenary meetings of the regional committees, territorial committees and the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics. Members of the Central Committee who have not been elected as delegates from local organizations shall have a voice at the Conference, but no vote.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ The Duties of Primary Organizations in Industry and inComrades, during this period the primary organizations, which constitute the foundation of our Party, have grown stronger, their contacts with the masses have improved, the vanguard role of the Communists has been enhanced, and Party life has risen to a higher plane. The Party organizations are taking a closer interest in the practical economic and cultural problems of socialist construction.
Experience has shown that the Party organizations have worked well wherever they have been able to combine Party political work with the fight for the fulfilment of production plans, for the* improvement of the work of the state apparatus, for the mastery of new technique, for strict labour discipline, for the development of the Stakhanov movement, and for the promotion of new cadres to Party and business posts. And, vice versa, wherever the Party organizations have held aloof from production, confining their duties to propaganda and agitation, or wherever the Party organizations have taken upon themselves the unwarranted function of directing business affairs, assuming the duties of the business bodies and detracting from their responsibility, there the work has inevitably found itself in difficulties.
Comrade Stalin has repeatedly pointed to the necessity for a correct combination of Party political work and business work. He said as far back as 1923:
``Our industrial nuclei must be brought to take an interest in the questions arising from the course of affairs in the factories 214 and trusts. Matters must be so arranged as to enable the nuclei to keep in touch with the work of the managerial bodies of our factories and trusts, so that they may be in a position to influence this work. You, as representatives of nuclei, know how great is the moral responsibility of our industrial nuclei to the non-Party masses for the course of affairs in the factories. If a nucleus is to be in a position to guide and lead the non-Party masses in its factory, if it is to be in a position to bear responsibility for the course of affairs in the factory---and that it is morally responsible to the non-Party masses for any shortcomings in the factory is unquestionable---it must be in touch with the course of affairs, it must have the opportunity to influence them one way or another. It is therefore necessary that the nuclei should be drawn into the discussion of the business problems of the factory, that business conferences of representatives of the nuclei in the factories forming part of a trust should be summoned from time to time for the discussion of questions affecting the affairs of the trust. This is a sure and necessary means of enriching our Party masses with business experience and of organizing control from below." (J. Stalin, "The Tasks of the Party.")
I shall mention, by way of example, the experience of the Party organization at the huge Kirov Works in Leningrad. The TrotskyBukharin bandits who at one time had charge of this plant did it a lot of damage and reduced it to such a plight that in the middle of 1937 it was scarcely fulfilling its program 45-50 per cent in many branches.
Now the plant is being managed by new people who have risen from the ranks of its technical intelligentsia, from the ranks of its Stakhanovites and shock workers.
In the past year there has been a marked improvement in the work of the Kirov plant, and in this a big part was played by the Party organization and its committee, who succeeded in correctly combining Party political work with production work.
The experience of the Communists of the Kirov Works shows that a correct combination of Party political work and production work does not result either in violating the principle of one-man management, or in forgetting Party mass work.
What largely contributed to this was the advancement to the leadership of the Party organization of people well acquainted with the technical and business affairs of the plant, people from the 215 shops, from the various sections of the plant, people closely connected with the whole body of workers, technicians and engineers.
The Party organization of the Kirov Works boldly rooted out the hostile elements in the plant and promoted new cadres---about five hundred of the best Stakhanovites, engineers and technicians, who are now managing the plant, and managing it not at all badly.
Paying attentive heed to the signals coming from the rank-- andfile workers and office employees, the Party organization was able to contribute to the solution of a number of important business problems of the plant. The Party organization took a lively part in the reform of the wages system in the plant, which had been reduced to chaos by the wreckers. Instead of one hundred different rate categories there are now only four, and hundreds of thousands of rates have been revised. This was of the greatest significance for the proper organization of labour and for the improvement of productivity of labour.
During the past six months the plant has been fulfilling its production programs without excess expenditure on wages, and the new standards of output have been greatly exceeded.
The Party committee of the Kirov Works helped the management to regulate power consumption at the plant, recommending fresh people for this job and helping to work out practical measures of improvement. As a result, the plant has successfully coped with the government program of doubling the output of tractors by the spring sowing of 1939.
Here is another example. The Yaroslavl Rubber Works had not been fulfilling its production program for seven years running. The whole country suffered from the unsatisfactory work of the Rubber Works, whose management had at one time fallen into the hands of enemies of the people.
The Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) helped the Bolsheviks of the Rubber Works to expose and eliminate the enemies of the people and demanded that the plant should at an early date be made one of the foremost in the country in respect to fulfilment of program. The Party organization of the Yaroslavl Rubber Works has fulfilled the demand of the Central Committee with honour. The plant carried out its program of output of automobile tyres 100 per cent in the fourth quarter of 1938, 106 per cent in January 1939, and 108 per cent in February. Success in production wias accompanied by the growth of the Party organization, the membership of which increased more in the fourth quarter of 1938 than in the preceding two years.
216What did the Party organization of toe Rubber Works owe its success to? To the fact that it correctly combined production work with political work. It arranged its work in such a way as to make the fulfilment of the production program a high political duty, and the whole body of employees of the works was imbued with this spirit. The Party organization distributed its Party cadres in a way that enabled it to keep in touch with what was being done in every part of the plant. Neither the district committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) nor the Party organization encroached on the functions of the plant management. On the contrary, they created the conditions to enable the management to display independence and initiative; but the Party organization kept in touch with every step of the management, and, being well informed of the state of affairs in the plant, when necessary guided, taught, and assisted the management.
While vigorously criticizing the chaos and irresponsibility which the enemies of the people had fostered over a long period of time, the Party organization gave moral and political support to every executive, to every worker and office employee in the plant who worked with a will.
Scores and hundreds of examples like that of the Kirov Works and the Yaroslavl Rubber Works could be cited. The Calibre Works and the First Watch and Clock Factory in Moscow, a number of aircraft factories, a number of iron and steel works, the Svet Shakhtyora Works in Kharkov, the New Sormovo Works in the Gorky Region and many other plants are also setting an example of correct combination of Party and production work in the life of the primary Party organizations.
In all the republics, territories and regions numbers of Party organizations are to be found which have succeeded in adopting a correct attitude to production questions, in instituting control over the work of their plants and in helping the managements to fulfil and overfulfil the programs of output.
I also want to mention the experience of the Central Committee Party organizers in the munitions plants. Comrade Stalin attributes the greatest importance to this matter. He proposed the institution in the munitions plants of a system of Party organizers subordinated to the Central Committee, and the selection of skilled engineers, experts at their job and good Party men, for this purpose. This measure has proved its value and has yielded very good results. We now have a new type of functionary in the munitions plants, men who combine 217 Party work with the ability to form an opinion about any particular business or technical problem.
We know that the ignorance of technical and business matters displayed by certain Party functionaries played into the hands of the wreckers. Our primary Party organizations constitute the vanguard in our factories, the flower of the personnel. We must benefit by the experience of that vanguard body which Communists represent in the factories. If you want to ascertain the state of affairs with regard to the fulfilment of an important order, or the way the director's fund is being expended, or the housing conditions of the workers, or the state of the workers' dining rooms, you must throw into the scales the whole experience of the Party organizations, you must illuminate every side of the production life of the factories with the Bolshevik searchlight. In this way we shall render real service to the whole cause of socialist economic development.
During the discussion voices were raised claiming that to grant the right of control to primary Party organizations in production units would be a blow to the principle of one-man management. It seems to me that those who think that one-man management just means commanding a factory without relying on the active personnel have no conception of what one-man management means.
Our Soviet, Bolshevik principle of one-man management implies the ability to direct, to organize, to select cadres, to issue correct orders, to demand a report of work done, and to eliminate irresponsibility and divided responsibility. But it also implies the ability to secure the support in this work of the Party organization, the active of the factory, and of its whole personnel.
It is therefore wrong to say that we can dispense with control by the primary Party organizations. Those executives who fear this kind of control are making a mistake.
In this connection, the time is ripe for precisely defining the duties of the various types of primary Party organizations, and, in particular, of those in production units (factories, mills, state farms and collective farms) and those in People's Commissariats.
Party organizations of the production type should be given the right to exercise control over the state of affairs in factories, state farms and collective farms. This should result in enhancing the role and sense of responsibility of primary Party organizations in production units.
As to the Party organizations of the People's Commissariat type, inasmuch as they cannot exercise functions of control, owing to the 218 specific conditions of their work, they should play a greater part in improving the work of the apparatus. It is their duty to draw attention to defects in their particular People's Commissariat, to note shortcomings in the work of any of the personnel, and to inform the Central Committee and the heads of the People's Commissariat of them.
Comrade Stalin defined the duties of nuclei in Sbviet institutions at a meeting of the Organization Bureau of the Central Committee on March 15, 1926, when he said:
``Our nuclei in Soviet institutions must be the guardians of real Soviet order in our institutions.... The nuclei must see that at least elementary order, elementary responsiveness, a readiness to listen to people, and less bureaucracy are displayed in Soviet in.stitutions, both -government and business. ... We must see to it that the nuclei in Soviet institutions live the life of the whole Party, help the Party to improve and simplify the Soviet and business apparatus and bring it closer to the people, to make it honest and economical." (See Izvestia of the C.C. of the C.P.S.U.[B.], No. 16-17, 1926.)
All Party members working in a given People's Commissariat should be united in one general Party organization of that People's Commissariat. The secretary of the Party organization of a People's Commissariat should be endorsed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.). It is hardly necessary to go into long explanations of the necessity for this latter proposal---it is self-evident.
__*_*_*__Comrades, I have set forth the principal amendments and additions to the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.) proposed in the theses.
Besides these amendments and additions, mention should be made of other additions that are prompted by the experience of the Party, such as, that regional committees and territorial committees should have four or five secretaries; that the rights of area Party organizations should be denned in the Rules; that the clauses in the Rules relating to Party organizations in the Red Army should be extended to Party organizations in the Navy. These additions, I believe, do not need explanation.
In amendment of the existing rule it is proposed henceforth to call the elected organs of primary organizations bureaus instead of committees.
219The reason for this change is that committees are formed to unite several Party organizations of equal status. That is the tradition in our Party and it is an expedient one. As for the elected organs of the primary Party organizations, it is more advisable to call them bureaus to distinguish them from committees.
The Central Committee also attributes great importance to granting Party organizations in factory shops the right---under certain conditions, namely, if they have not less than fifteen members---to elect a bureau. You know that, by decision of the Central Committee, shop committees were set up in the larger industrial plants. Experience has fully justified their formation.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Summary of the Discussion of the Theses of the Report onI shall now proceed to discuss the corrections and amendments which were proposed during the discussion in the Party organizations of the theses of the report on amendments to the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.).
A very wide discussion developed over the theses, the result of which was that the theses were approved by the vast majority of Party members and by all Party organizations. (Stormy applause.)
The discussion yielded a fairly large number of corrections and amendments both to the theses themselves and to a number of clauses of the existing Rules to which no amendments were proposed in the theses.
In view of the great variety of the amendments, it would be fitting to divide them into several categories.
There are a number of meaningless corrections of no practical value, as, for example, that Party organs should be elected once in five years; that secretaries of Party organizations should be elected at general meetings and not by the committees or bureaus, that is, that the secretaries should be made independent of the committees or bureaus; that new members should be admitted into the Party at ceremonial meetings,' and so on.
The uselessness of these corrections and amendments are selfevident, and there is no need to argue against them. They fall to the ground as worthless. (Laughter and applause.)
Secondly, there are a large number of corrections, amendments and comments which do not relate directly to the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.) but to the current work of Party organization.
220Such, for example, are the proposals that at least three evenings in five be kept free of all meetings and conferences, so that comrades might rest and study theory; to institute Party days; to forbid the adoption of decisions by a canvass of opinion; that a bureau of the district committee should be elected in districts where the Party organizations are small; that the Party organizations of machine and tractor stations should register tractor drivers and harvester combine operators; that Party committees of railway junctions should be abolished, and so on and so forth.
The subject of all these corrections and amendments relate, as you see, to practical Party affairs. The authors of these corrections have apparently not grasped the difference between the Rules and current Party affairs, and therefore try to squeeze into the Rules as large a number of clauses as possible, forgetting that the Rules only lay down the general framework, the basic forms of organizational activity of the Party, and that they do not preclude, but on the contrary presume, current activity by Party bodies.
The Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.) which the Eighteenth Party Congress will endorse lay down the organizational basis for the future activities of the directing Party bodies. Corrections and amendments of this kind should be submitted to the new Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) to be elected.
The third group of amendments relate directly to the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.). A large number of them concern questions of formulation and should be submitted to the Rules Commission of the Eighteenth Congress which I presume the Congress will set up and instruct to draft the Rules in their final form.
As to the corrections and amendments of real importance, it is advisable to divide them into three categories: those that are unacceptable and should be rejected; those whose advisability should be ventilated at the Congress; and, lastly, those that should be adopted.
I shall first deal with the unacceptable proposals.
1. There are amendments designed to preserve the categories of admission in one form or another. They include proposals of the most varied kind. They are all based on the belief of their authors that the abolition of the different categories is untimely. It is proposed to establish two or three categories: one for workers, another for peasants and intellectuals, or to set up a special category for members of the old intelligentsia, and so on. These proposals should not be adopted.
The feature of these amendments is that their authors either 221 ignore or have failed to grasp the essence of the fundamental changes in the relations of classes that have taken place in the U.S.S.R. They either cling to the old and fail to see the new, or they are simply dead asleep and do not notice what is going on around them. (Applause.)
2. There are a number of amendments of a diametrically opposite type, amendments which go further than the requirements for admission to the Party proposed in the theses. Whereas the first group of amendments, as we have just seen, proposed to preserve the old conditions of admission, the second group proposes to go much further than the requirements proposed in the theses. For example, it is proposed that the period of probation membership should be not one year, but nine months, six months, or even three months; that the requirements regarding the length of Party membership of recomm,enders should be abolished; that the number of recommenders should be reduced, and so on and so forth. I think that amendments of this kind spring from the failure of certain Party members to understand the character of our Party and show that some Party members have forgotten the basic principle that the strength of our Party does not lie in abolishing the boundaries between Party and nonParty, between Party members and non-Party people, and in dissolving itself, diffusing itself among the masses, but in the fact that, acting as a rallying ground for the foremost people of the working class, the peasantry and the intelligentsia, it does not strive for size of membership but for quality of membership, is concerned for the high title of Party member, for the staunchness of Party members and their devotion to the cause of the working class.
The authors of such amendments have the wrong idea that the Party does not intend to show any further concern for the quality of its members and is throwing its doors wide open to all who want to join it. This mistaken view has nothing in common with the Party's policy of a strictly individual selection of really foremost people for the ranks of the Party.
Do the substantial changes in the procedure of admission of new members imply that the Party is in any way relaxing the tried and tested Leninist principle of individual selection for the ranks to the Party? Not in the least.
The Central Committee and Comrade Stalin have many times made it absolutely clear that what is important for the Party is not so much the number of its members as their quality, their staunchness. Here, for example, is what Comrade Stalin said on July 6, 1921, 222 in his report at a general meeting of the Tiflis Organization of the Georgian Communist Party:
``It should be .remembered once and for all that the strength and weight of a party, and especially of the Communist Party, depends not so much on the number of its members as on their quality, their staunchness and devotion to the cause of the proletariat."
In the solemn vow Comrade Stalin made at the Second All-Union Congress of Soviets on January 26, 1924, at the time of Lenin's death, he said:
``It is not given to everyone to be a member of such a party. It is not given to everyone to withstand the hardships and storms connected with membership of such a party. It is the sons of the working class, the sons of want and struggle, the sons of incredible privation and heroic efforts who before all should be members of such a party. That is why the party of the Leninists, the party of the Communists is also called the party of the working class.''
In the resolution of the Thirteenth Party Congress on "The Immediate Tasks of Party Development," the Party pointed out that what was important when admitting new members was not formalities, but essentials. This resolution stated:
``'Not only must the established formal requirements be observed when admitting a new member into the Party, but it is essential to ascertain his real capacity to help the Party and the organs of the proletarian' dictatorship in practice.''
This principle of strict individual approach to applicants for membership of the Party is an immutable law of our Party, it is not subject to change.
In the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Party Congresses the Central Committee of the Party has repeatedly pointed to the danger of forgetting the principle of individual admission into the Party.
Alien and hostile elements have always striven to enter the ranks of the C:P.S.U. (B.) so as to use the title of Party member as a screen in their work of Undermining the great cause of the working class.
The Central Committee has done immense work to combat violations of the principle of individual selection of new members of the Party.
223The Central Committee has vigorously fought attempts to ignore Lenin's precept that ours is the only Party in the world which is concerned not so much to increase the number of its members as to improve their quality.
The Central Committee of the Party has strictly warned Party organizations of the danger of distortions of policy and of repetitions of mistakes, of the danger of substituting for a careful individual selection of new members for the Party a pernicious wholesale campaign for new members, which in the past has contaminated the ranks of the C.P.S.U. (B.) with alien and hostile elements.
The verification of Party records and exchange of Party cards disclosed the extreme neglect and chaos that reigned in this respect. It is therefore clear that the principle of individually selecting for the Party the really foremost people, people really devoted to the cause of the working class, the best people of our country among the ranks of the workers, peasants and working intelligentsia, people who have been tested on various sectors of the struggle for socialism, who do not shrink from difficulites but become steeled in the fight to overcome them, was, is and will be the decisive principle of our Party in the matter of admitting new members into its ranks.
At the same time the Party is interested in creating all the conditions to enable the really foremost people to enter its ranks. The amendments to the Rules will in fact create these conditions.
3. A number of comrades propose to establish a special category for persons who have once been Party members. This seems to me unnecessary. If, while they were outside the ranks of the Party, such comrades proved that they are devoted and active workers, they can be accepted on the same terms as comrades newly entering the Party. If, however, while they were outside the ranks of the Party they did not prove their devotion, they will evidently not be accepted and nobody will give them a recommendation.
4. Further, amendments are proposed with regard to the requirement that the recommender should have known the person he recommends from having worked with him. It is proposed in the case of persons in the ranks of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army to fix the period at six months, on the grounds of the specific conditions of life prevailing in the Red Army. I think we should reject this proposal. Firstly, it creates different conditions for territorial Party organizations and for army Party organizations, which is undesirable. Secondly, recommendations may be given not only by comrades who know the applicant from working with him in his present factory or 224 institution, but by those who worked with him in other places; and, furthermore, there is no need to make the attendance of the recommender obligatory when the application for membership is being discussed. Finally, a Party organization may, if necessary, when sufficient recommendations cannot be obtained locally, make enquiries about the applicant for membership at the organizations where he previously worked, or of comrades who could recommend him from having worked with him before.
5. A number of proposals have been made to confer on shop Party meetings in large Party organizations, with over five hundred members, the right to admit members into the Party, instead of their being admitted at the general Party meeting. Proposals have also been made to grant all shop Party organizations the right to admit members into the Party, instead of their being admitted at the general meeting of the primary Party organization.
I think the proposal we should here adopt is as follows: large factory Party organizations of over five hundred or seven hundred members (this should be discussed at the Congress) should be allowed to form a factory committee instead of a bureau of the primary organization.
Some comrades have proposed that district committees should be formed in such factories. In my opinion this would be wrong, for we should then have two different kinds of district committees--- territorial district committees and industrial district committees. In factory Party organizations with over five hundred or seven hundred members it would be advisable to form factory Party committees and to give the shop Party organizations in such large factories rights under the Rules.
As to the proposal to grant the right of admitting new members into the Party to all shop organizations, that is, to extend to all shop primary organizations rights under the Rules, it should be rejected, because it tends to diminish the importance of the general factory organization. It is the factory above all that is our fortress, and it would be wrong to split up the general Party organization in the factory by giving prime importance to the shop. We must not minimize the educational role of the general Party organization in the factory and the significance of the general factory Party meeting in the matter of admitting new members into the Party.
6. A number of proposals have been made to set up various new departments in Party organs. The theses of the Central Committee, __PRINTERS_P_225_COMMENT__ 15---263 225 as you know, aim at reducing the number of departments, and propose that the chief departments should be the Cadres Administration and the Propaganda and Agitation Administration of the Central Committee and the corresponding departments in the localities. But these comrades want just the opposite and would have the number of departments enlarged. They propose to set up new departments like a Health Department, Stakhanov Movement Department, and so on. (Laughter.)
This proposal should be rejected. Only in the case of one department is the matter debatable: I am referring to the proposal to set up Defence Departments, which is worth discussing at the Congress.
7. It is proposed to extend the clause concerning Party actives to rural organizations. I think this is also a question which the Congress should discuss, for there are arguments for and against it.
What are the arguments for? They are that in rural districts, especially large ones, it is not always convenient to call general district meetings of Communists, and that meetings of the Party active should be called, as in the case of the towns, to discuss current questions of Party policy. As to the arguments against, they are that in the majority of the rural districts general meetings of the organizations can be called whenever necessary. We know that general meetings are of great educational and organizational value. Some comrades fear that the actives might encroach on the functions of the general Party meeting, and point out that the summoning of actives should not be abused. As you see, it would be advisable to ventilate the question at the Congress.
8. It is proposed to establish secretariats, in addition to bureaus, in all regional committees and city committees. This is also a proposal which needs to be discussed at the Congress. There are arguments for and against it. The arguments for are that when the leadership has to discuss a large number of questions of organization, some supplementary body like a secretariat is required. There is no need to summon a bureau for every question, it is claimed. At a first glance, this seems a very alluring and practical proposal. But on the other hand, there are fears that the creation of secretariats might minimize the role of the bureau, the role of collective leadership! Might it not lead to a certain shifting of the centre of leadership from the bureau to a narrower body, the secretariat? I think that this is also a question that requires discussion at the Congress.
9. It is proposed to reduce the length of Party membership required of leading Party officials, and some even propose not to make 226 any length of membership a requirement when electing comrades to leading Party posts. I think this proposal is wrong, because length of membership is required not only as a formal criterion but as a testimony of a certain experience in Party work. We must not forget what Comrade Stalin said about the necessity of combining the experience of young and old Party members. Hence the proposal to amend the requirements of the Rules in respect to the length of membership of leading Party workers which is contained in the theses of the Central Committee should be sufficient to ensure the promotion of young cadres, and to go to greater lengths in the way of reduction would be inexpedient.
10. It is proposed that the right of control should be granted to Soviet nuclei as well as production nuclei. I consider this proposal unacceptable, for it springs from a forgetfulness of the specific conditions in which the Soviet nuclei work.
To what extremes this forgetfulness may lead is shown by the case of the Party organizations in the People's Commissariat of Agriculture of the U.S.S.R. and the People's Commissariat of State Farms of the U.S.S.R.
These Party organizations became obsessed with the idea of controlling the activities of the heads of the People's Commissariats. They set up within the People's Commissariats what was essentially a second centre, which established connections with the provincial organizations, giving them instructions, and so on. And just see what questions these Party organizations took upon themselves to discuss. The Party organization of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture discussed the state of sowing in the U.S.S.R.! (Laughter.) Why, this is ludicrous! As if it can judge from here how the sowing is going in the Kuban or in Central Asia. Yet it presumes to issue ``directives''! It discussed preparations for the harvesting season, supply of fuel to machine and tractor stations, normal financing of the machine and tractor stations, and so; on and so forth---ithat is to say, it tried to duplicate and assume the functions of the People's Commissariat. No good can come of that.
The Party organization of the People's Commissariat of State Farms discussed the state of haymaking in the eastern state farms. (Laughter.) What on earth can it know about this subject? Yet it, too, tried to issue "directives.''
Instead of taking measures to ensure that Party and state discipline are observed and to keep a proper check on the fulfilment of __PRINTERS_P_227_COMMENT__ 15* 227 government instructions, instead of interesting themselves in the state of the apparatus and the ability and political fitness of its personnel, and drawing attention to defects in the work of the People's Commissariat, they tried to assume the functions of the heads of the People's Commissariat and to direct the provincial organizations.
This is a vicious practice and should not be encouraged. It is a sample of confusion of elementary concepts regarding the duties of Soviet nuclei. It is a parody on leadership, an attempt to create a People's Commissariat within a People's Commissariat.
It is a specific feature of the Soviet nuclei that they cannot undertake functions of control over the work of the Soviet institutions as such---that is a matter for higher Party and Soviet bodies.
But this does not mean that the primary Party organizations in Soviet institutions have no opportunity of influencing affairs. On the contrary, the role of these Party organizations is an extremely important one. If the Party organization in a Soviet institution notices defects in the work of the institution in good time---for example, in relation to the examination of complaints and applications from the public, the treatment of visitors (which are matters of utmost importance in the work of Soviet institutions), labour discipline, the work of the apparatus, etc.---if the Party nucleus draws the attention of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and of the heads of the People's Commissariat to such defects, it will be performing an important function in improving the government apparatus.
11. It is proposed to sanction the formation of bureaus in primary Party organizations and in shop Party organizations with seven to ten members.
Seven members are to elect a bureau of three! This would be substituting bureau meetings for the general meetings of the Party organization, which would be wrong.
Such are the proposals and additions which directly relate to the Rules, but which in my opinion are unacceptable.
I shall now pass to the proposals which in my opinion are acceptable.
1. A number of comrades point to the necessity of revising the preamble to the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.) so as to make it conform with the changes in the situation in the country.
I think this proposal is a right one and should be adopted.
2. There was a very lively exchange of opinions during the discussion over the question of the sympathizers' groups. Judging by the most prevalent opinion, the sympathizers' groups should be abolished.
228Comrades point out that in view of the growth of a large nonParty active around the Party, and in view of the resumption of the admission of new members, the sympathizers' groups have outlived their function. Admissions into the Party do not proceed in the main by way of the sympathizers' groups. This is borne out by the fact, for example, that of the new candidate members accepted during the past two years only twenty-one per cent came from the sympathizers' groups.
Are we not bound to draw the lesson from this practical experience? I think we are.
There are a large number of organizations around the Party which connect it with the masses. I am referring to an organization like the trade unions, the effect of whose work in educating its members should be to raise them to an understanding of the tasks of the Communist vanguard, that is, to a Party level, and to prepare its best people to join the Party.
Unfortunately, our trade unions do not set themselves this aim quite as much as they should; yet it is the direct duty of Communists working in trade unions to carry on educational work within them in such a way as to raise the level of the foremost, the most active people in the trade unions, to a Party level.
We have a ramified system of social organizations of various kinds---Soviets, the Young Communist League, the cooperative societies, the Chemical and Air Defence Society, etc.---each of which has a large number of active non-Party workers, the best of whom could be selected for admission to the Party.
From this point of view, the sympathizers' groups narrow the field in preparing the best people among the working class, the collective farm peasantry and the intelligentsia to join the Party.
I think it would be better to accept the best, most prepared, foremost people not into sympathizers' groups, but directly into the Party as candidate members. (Hear, hear! Applause.)
3. It is proposed that the reinstatement of. persons wrongfully expelled from the Party should be announced in the press.
This is a good suggestion and should be adopted.
4. It is proposed to delete from the Rules the clause concerning the Soviet Control Commission, in view of the fact that the proposal to change the character of the work of the Party Control Commission must lead to a change in the character of the activities of the Soviet Control Commission, and that the Regulations governing that body have to be confirmed by the government.
229I consider the proposal a correct one, inasmuch as constitutional changes in the structure of our legislative and executive organs of Soviet government undoubtedly demand corresponding changes in the case of the Soviet Control Commission.
5. Next, there is another addition to the Rules which should be accepted. It is proposed to state in the Rules that comrades may be admitted to the Party from the age of eighteen. (Applause.)
6. Very important additions have been proposed designed to give a more precise definition in the Rules of a number of points concerning the Young Communist League. The question of the Young Communist League is not sufficiently reflected in our Rules, where there are three clauses relating to the League. The first provides that young people up to the age of twenty are admitted to the Party only through the Y.C.L. The second clause states that the recommendation of a district committee of the Y.C.L. is equivalent to two recommendations of Party members; and the third clause relates to the formation of joint Party-Y.C.L. groups where there are no primary Party organizations.
These clauses in the Rules defining the relations between the Party and the Y.C.L. are no longer adequate. I think it necessary to discuss two proposals at the Congress.
The first is that Y.C.L. members who join the Party and do not belong to the ``commanding'' staff of the Y.C.L.---I am referring to rank-and-file members---should not be obliged to belong to the two organizations, the Party and the Y.C.L. If they are not performing important duties on leading bodies of the Y.C.L. on the instructions of the Party, it would be better if they belonged only to the Party organization. (Applause.)
The practice (and it is not altogether a right one) is to begin to transfer to the Party Y.C.L. members of the age of twenty-five or twenty-six; i. e., chiefly over-aged Y. C. L. members. And it is now the common thing in the Y.C.L. to say: "We will first select for the Party the over-aged, and then we will tackle the younger members." The proposed addendum to the Rules that persons of the age of eighteen may be admitted to the Party will help greatly to strengthen educational work in the Y.C.L. The "twenty-year olders" (laughter) are in a bad way, because they are kept to ``mature'' in the Y.C.L. and no hurry is shown to transfer them to the Party; yet they are people in the flush of life and health and enjoy full civil rights. I think it would be inadvisable to keep these people five or six extra years in the Y.C.L. by making it difficult for them to join the Party.
230Y.C.L. members not holding leading posts in that organization should be allowed, on joining the Party, to belong to only one organization, namely, the Party organization. They will then receive their training in both educational and organizational work wholly in the Party. .Why should they be under two district committees and two primary organizations? Why should they have to think about what study circle to join---Y.C.L. or Party? I think the position of Y.C.L. members who belong to the Party should be clearly defined. A man has passed through the preparatory school of the Y.C.L., is worthy of joining the Party, and has been accepted into its ranks. Let him then work in its organization. I think this will clarify the position of Communists of Y.C.L. age and at the same time will help to improve the whole work of the Y.C.L. in educating and preparing its best people to join the Party. (Applause.)
Secondly, I think the time has also come to strengthen the role of the Y.C.L. in state and economic affairs, and to have this reflected in the Party Rules.
Comrades, in spite of the immense importance of the Y.C.L., and in spite of the immense assistance it renders the Party, it suffers from one defect to which the attention both of the Y.C.L. and of our Party organizations should be drawn, and that is that it does not take a sufficient part in the life of the state and is too prone to confine itself to its own Y.C.L. affairs.
We must now examine the matter from another aspect: as far as the agitation and propaganda work of the Y.C.L. is concerned, it is perfectly clear, in the light of the recent decision of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.), that this work will to a considerable extent be conducted by the Party. We must give the utmost-help to the Y.C.L. in this respect both in the way of forces and experience. It would be unthinkable otherwise.
The internal work of the Y.C.L. is very important. But what is its purpose? It obviously must not be an aim in itself. I think the whole work of the Y.C.L. should be radically switched over to training its members to take an active part in state and Party affairs, to the performance of those important tasks of the Y.C.L. which arise from its role of helper of the Party.
And what does this mean practically? It means, for example, that where there is no primary Party organization, but there is a primary Y.C.L. organization, it should assume the function of an active vehicle of the Party's directions. Why should it not take part in the discussion and decision of economic questions? Let us say, for example, that 231 there is chaos in the administration of a collective farm, that the sowing is going badly, that labour discipline is at a low level---what is to prevent the Y.C.L. organization discussing these questions? Why cannot a Y.C.L. organization take up the question of incompetent work of the management board of a collective farm and set to work to have a bad board replaced by a good one? Why cannot a Y.C.L. organization discuss the shortcomings of a village Soviet? Why cannot it, on the instructions of the Party district committee, undertake to carry out the Party's instructions and directions if they are not being attended to simply because there is no primary Party organization? I consider that the Y.C.L. organization can do this and should do it. The Y.C.L. organizations should have the right of initiative in submitting to Party organizations big and little questions affecting state and economic affairs, questions concerning the improvement of production work in factory or collective farm, the Stakhanov movement, the state of public baths or public laundries, bad traffic regulation, disorderliness in schools, and so on---I will not enumerate all the big and little problems of our Soviet and economic affairs. Are Y.C.L. organizations paying much attention to these questions now? I affirm that they are not. If the Y.C.L. organizations set to work on these questions, and do not only discuss internal Y.C.L. affairs, do not stew in their own juice, they will enter the broad field of more active participation in all our work of socialist construction. The growth of the cadres of future Party and state workers will be greatly accelerated. The Y.C.L. members will receive a real schooling. (Applause.)
In view of this, I do not think that we should adopt the proposal to abolish joint Party-Y.C.L. groups, a proposal which is based on the alleged grounds that these groups have no virility. They have no virility just now because they do not know what to do. If we put a new content into the work of the Party-Y.C.L. groups, if, for example, Communists in the rural localities, wherever there are not enough of them to form a Party organization, get together with the Y.C.L. members to discuss how to improve the affairs of the collective farm, how to improve cultural and political work, to work out a general line of conduct with regard to important political, economic and cultural affairs in their locality, such Party-Y.C.L. groups should be preserved and not abolished. (Applause.)
7. The next proposal is that Party cards should not be taken away from persons when expelled from the Party until the expulsion has been endorsed by the regional committee. This proposal is a right one and should be adopted.
2328. There was a proposal that plenary meetings of city committees and district committees should be held not less than once in six weeks. It would be advisable to adopt this proposal too.
9. It has been proposed, in amendment of the existing clause of the Rules, to sanction the formation of Party groups in Party organizations with less than one hundred Communists. As you know, the Rules provide for the formation of Party groups only where there are one hundred Communists and over. I think that this is also a proposal that should be accepted.
10. There is one other amendment suggested to the Rules; it is that the opinion of social organizations regarding an applicant for membership in the Party should not be demanded. I think this proposal is advisable. The recommendations of Party comrades are quite sufficient when a person applies to join the Party.
Such are the proposals and additions to the Rules which it would be advisable to adopt.
__*_*_*__Comrades, the discussion of the Rules has been of great benefit to the Party. It has revealed a heightened sense of responsibility in Party members for the affairs of the Party, an increased concern of every Party member for his mother, the Party. The discussion has revealed a tremendous growth in the ideological solidarity of the members of our Party.
For its dimensions, the discussion was an absolutely unprecedented event in the life of our Party. It revealed that the Party is moving at full speed to the complete activization of its ranks, denoting a hitherto unprecedented scope of Party activity.
The U.S.S.R. has entered a new phase of development---the phase of the completion of the building of socialism and of gradual transition from Socialism to Communism.
This new phase of our historic cause still more enhances the role and significance of our Party.
New grand and impressive prospects are opening up before our Party; new great and complex tasks are confronting it. If it is to accomplish these tasks and perform its role of vanguard fighter in the building of a communist society, our Party must ceaselessly sharpen its organizational weapon. The Party Rules adopted by our Congress will be the Rules of the Party of victorious socialism, Rules which will arm our Party members for the successful 233 accomplishment of the task of gradual transition to Communism. (Stormy applause.)
Armed with the advanced theory, armed with the advanced policy, organization and ideology of the foremost class, and having rallied around itself the great and vast Soviet people, our Party is entering the fight for the gradual transition to Communism. (Stormy applause.}
Many a time have the forces of decaying capitalism attempted to halt our victorious advance, and they will try to many a time again.
We know that difficulties await us. We realize the complexity of the new tasks we have taken upon ourselves. But we know both the means and conditions of our ultimate victory.
Comrade Stalin said at the Sixteenth Party Congress that our Party will be invincible if it does not fear difficulties and (knows how to shape its course. Our great Bolshevik Party is such an invincible Party. (Stormy applause. All rise.)
Comrades, we, the warriors in the army of the great proletarian strategists, the army of Lenin and Stalin, solidly welded around the Leninist-Stalinist Central Committee, around our teacher and leader, Comrade Stalin, will carry forward our glory-wreathed banner, the banner of Bolshevism, to the complete victory of Communism. (Stormy applause.)
Long live our great Party!
Long live the genius, the brain, the heart of the Bolshevik Party, of the whole Soviet people, of the whole of progressive and advanced humanity---our Stalin! (Loud and prolonged applause and cheers. All rise.)
[234]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
A. ANDREYEV
Comrades, the general atmosphere on the eve of the Congress, the character of the internal Party discussion on the Congress agenda and the manner of election of the delegates to the Congress indicated that our Party in its entirety came to its Eighteenth Congress with a sense of deep moral satisfaction in the results of its labours, conscious of its great strength and profoundly grateful to Comrade Stalin for having piloted the Party to new victories, despite all difficulties, during the period ,under review as well. (Prolonged applause.)
The enthusiasm which the Congress has evoked all over the country, in our mills, factories and collective farms, likewise shows that this feeling of deep moral satisfaction is experienced not only by the Party but by the country at large, by our great Soviet people as a whole.
And what else could we be but morally satisfied at the results of the iwork of our Bolshevik Party when this past period in its life has been so eventful, so crowded with activity and new victories in all spheres of the political, economic and organizational work of our Party?
Take only a few of the results which Comrade Stalin has noted. While capitalism is still floundering about, is still marking time, unable even to get back to the 1929 level of production, the U.S.S.R. has made great progress in this period.
In comparison with 1929, our output has increased almost fivefold. In this period, under the leadership of the Party, the Second Five-Year Plan has been fulfilled ahead of schedule. The socialist 235 system has triumphed and established itself finally. The abolition of the exploiting classes has been completed, an enormous stride forward to classless society has been made by the progressive obliteration of the line of demarcation between the working class and ,the peasantry as the result of the success of collectivization and the growth of Socialism. As Comrade Stalin has said, a complete cultural revolution has taken place in the country during this period.
In this same period the people of our country have had the opportunity to adopt the great Stalin Constitution, and the Bolshevik Party has been able to feel time and time again the trust which the entire country reposes in it.
During the period under review we have witnessed a wide-spread development of the Stakhanov movement, a popular movement in the full sense of the term, embracing all branches of economy and labour, a movement which has been effecting a complete revolution in production and in the productivity of labour.
What feeling other than satisfaction, comrades, can we have, when the Party, with the support and participation of the whole people, has succeeded in routing, in destroying the Trotskyites and Bukharinites and other conspirators, wreckers, assassins and spies who, acting on the instructions of foreign espionage services, were preparing to overthrow the Soviet system and cast the peoples of the U.S.SJR. back into slavery?
There can be no doubt that the destruction .of these agents engaged in diversive activities, these interventionist cadres in our rear, has completely upset the calculations of our foreign enemies and has made it more difficult for them to launch a war on the Soviet Union.
While capitalism, caught in insoluble contradictions, has already drifted into a second imperialist war, our workers and peasants need, have no fears for the safety of their socialist country, because under the leadership of the Party the defences of the country have become stronger than ever in the period that has elapsed since the last Congress, and those of our disorderly neighbours who have attempted to trespass on Soviet territory and tried the strength of the U.S.S.R., the strength of our Red Army, have been badly battered. (Applause.)
Nor can we experience anything but deep satisfaction at the organizational work which the Party and its Central Committee have performed in the period under review and which was reported on by Comrade Stalin.
In this period millions of people from factories, collective farms and offices have been raised to active participation in the business 236 of government, in economic management and public life. Our country and state, our cultural and administrative bodies, have been enriched with hundreds of thousands of new specially trained professional personnel.
In these five years, the institutions of higher education and the vocational training schools have graduated 1,287,000 people of special training, not counting the military professions. Last year alone, our institutions of higher education and vocational training schools prepared 294,700 new specially trained men .and women.
In the period under review, under the leadership of the Party, 3,450 new machine and tractor stations, over 660 machine and tractor repair shops, and 939 new higher educational institutions and vocational training schools have been established. In this period the membership of the trade unions has increased by 4,700,000 and the membership of the Y.C.L. by about 3,000,000. In this period over 1,500,000 new tractor drivers and combine operators have been trained or given additional training. Hundreds of thousands of collective-farm chairmen and collecti-ve-farm brigade leaders have received supplementary training. Two thousand two hundred and fifty-five new primary Party organizations have been formed.
In view of weaknesses in the work of educating our forces ideologically and politically, the Central Committee, as you know, has done much to remedy the situation, especially Comrade Stalin himself, who, though he has .many other urgent matters to attend to in his daily work, provided our Party with a real history of the Bolshevik Party, thanks to which pur Party, our forces have ideologically risen several rungs in a short space of time. The resolution of the Central Committee on propaganda, formulated under the personal guidance and with the direct help of Comrade Stalin, is a practical militant program, signifying a new approach to the organization of the political education of our forces.
The Central Committe has explicitly posed the question of the organization of labour discipline in our industrial establishments and the status of foremen in a new way that has met with the warm support of the workers and technical personnel in our factories and mills, and which undoubtedly is already having a considerable effect on conditions in industry and on its output.
In this period, the Party and its Central Committee have frequently turned their attention to organizational questions affecting the development of collective farms and state farms. In their organizational work the Party and its Central Committee have paid special attention 237 to inner-Party life. As soon as it began to be felt that the internal life of the Party was defective in respect of the application of the principle of democracy, Comrade Stalin and the Central Committee raised the issue sharply and took steps to rectify these serious faults. Already the Party organizations have made marked progress in restoring normalcy in Party democracy, in enforcing the principle of the election and accountability of Party bodies and functionaries.
After amending these organizational deficiencies in internal Party democracy, the Party proceeded to amend similar, if not more serious defects in the trade unions and the Young Communist League. I take it that the leaders of the trade unions and the Y.C.L. will speak for themselves on the results of the work that has been performed in their organizations.
In this period the Party has put its house in order with regard to files and records and the registration of membership. I need only say that the Central Committee can now get an idea of each member of the Party at any moment. It is an undoubted achievement, in my opinion, that as a result of the tremendous organizational work performed by the Party organizations under the leadership of the Central Committee, our organizations have strengthened their connection with the masses, while the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the National Republics, the Regional Committees and Territorial Committees have strengthened their connection with the respective local organizations.
But the most important, the most admirable result of the organizational work of the Party has been undoubtedly the training of large forces and their promotion to leading positions in Party, Soviet, economic, trade union and Y.C.L. organizations.
We have hundreds of thousands 'of these young promotees, raised from the ranks of our politically most enlightened and promising citizens, from the ranks of the Stakhanovites and also from our university graduates.
I should like to read to you some of the most significant figures bearing upon the qualitative change that has taken place in our personnel.
Taking the secretaries of Regional Party Committees, Territorial Party Committees and the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the National Republics, we find that 28.6 per cent of them have a complete university education and 30 per cent a complete secondaryschool education or an incomplete university education.
Fifty-four per cent of the secretaries of Regional Committees, 238 Territorial Committees and the Centraf Committees of the Communist Parties of the National Republics have been promoted in recent years from lower functionaries and from work in primary Party organizations, while 39 of them had only just completed their studies when they were advanced to secretaryships.
Among the secretaries of District Committees, City Committees and Area Committees of our Party, 534 are university graduates and 2,581 have an incomplete university education or have been through the secondary school. Altogether, 7,250 persons have been promoted from the duties of lower functionaries and work in the primary Party organizations, while 185 persons were promoted straight from their studies.
Of the secretaries of primary Party committees, and of the Party organizers, 5,191 are university graduates and 18,677 have been through secondary schools.
Thus, there ,has been a decided change among our leading Party personnel to higher standards of education, and a wealth of first-hand experience of work in the primary organizations has been passed on to our leading Party bodies.
No less considerable are the qualitative changes that have taken place among our Soviet and economic executive personnel. For instance, the proportion of university graduates among the People's Commissars of the U.S.S.R. and the R.S.F.S.R. is 53 per cent, among the Assistant People's Commissars 68 per cent, among the directors of the .chief boards and syndicates of the People's Commissariats 60 per cent and among the directors of economic establishments.27.6 per cent. A fairly considerable number of Stakhanovites are now holding leading positions in the People's Commissariats and their chief departments, on the railroads and as directors of industrial establishments.
By replacing that part of our personnel which had proved to be bankrupt politically and professionally, and by promoting new people to leading positions, our Party has performed a great task, our Party has strengthened itself. Healthier conditions have been established in the state and economic apparatus. Our Party house has been scrubbed spick and span. Our contact with the masses and the local organizations has become stronger. These new people have brought firsthand experience of practical work from the ranks. Toadies and moral degenerates have disappeared to a large extent, because in the past they were encouraged iby people with a rotten political core which was the cause of their moral downfall.
In his report Comrade Stalin has told us that the bourgeois press 239 abroad teems with glaring announcements that the Bolshevik Party has weakened itself by its purge of the last two or three years. Well, let these gentlemen think so, if it is any consolation to them. We all know well enough that the Party has accomplished a great deal by promoting hundreds of thousands of new, fresh, unspoiled mem and women. We have thus achieved an all-round improvement in the leadership of the Party, Soviet, economic and trade union organizations. Things with us are incomparably more stable and secure now. But, comrades, in spite of the enormous amount of organizational work which has been done by the Party, we are still faced with a lot of work of which Comrade Stalin has spoken.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Some Problems of Organizational WorkIn the first place, it is true that the Party has solved a big organizational problem by the promotion of new forces. These new forces have practical! experience in the work of lower bodies, have a knowledge of life and the concrete situation, they have become more cultured, many of them having a university or secondary-school education. They have not been infected with the virus of bureaucracy, the noxious habit of issuing piles of orders. They are not afflicted with conceit, nor have they ,a leader complex. They are closer connected with the masses, and are more honest and devoted to their Party. A splendid fund of precious human material has been created. It is* our duty to treasure this fund, to help the new forces to rise to the level of genuine leaders. They have not yet had any real experience in leadership. We must help ^hem to get it and enable them to become true Bolsheviks in morale and in political training.
In the second place, Comrade Stalin has said that it must be made an essential part of Party leadership to correctly combine the Party's political work and economic leadership.
Can we say that the Party territorial committees, regional committees and district committees have in practice thoroughly mastered this organizational task? No, we cannot say so yet. Unfortunately even in the very recent past the Central Committee has had to correct some serious mistakes of regional committees in the nature of one-sided .leadership: either they are all engrossed in economic work and forget the Party's political tasks, or they drop economic work and only 240 return to it when they have to make good the resulting gaps in production.
The proposals for changes in the Party Rules which have been submitted to this Congress provide for the abolition of some of the industrial-branch departments in Party committees. But this does not imply in the least a narrowing down of our tasks of leadership of Soviet and economic work. In general it is difficult and even impossible to define what percentage of its attention and work our organizations should devote to Party political work and what percentage to economic leadership. We must be guided by what Comrade Stalin said in 1937 at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.):
``If now some of our comrades proceed to intensify Party political work, intending at the same time to withdraw from economic work, they will go to the other extreme which will entail no less sacrifice. One must not fly from one extreme to the other. One must not separate politics from economics. We cannot get away from economics any more than from politics. To facilitate study, people usually separate, methodologically, questions of economy from questions of politics. But this is done merely methodologically, artificially, solely for the purpose of facilitating study. In actual life, however, in practice, politics and economics are inseparable. They exist jointly and act jointly. Whoever thinks of separating economics from politics in our practical work, of intensifying economic work in derogation of political work, or, vice versa, of intensifying political work in derogation of economic work, is bound to reach an impasse.''
In the third place, Comrade Stalin has made it incumbent upon our Party organization, as one of its organizational tasks to strengthen certain branches of Soyiet and economic work by an infusion of fresh forces so that the Party organizations may not become substitutes of Soviets and economic bodies, and may not be converted into such. Here is what Comrade Stalin said on this subject in 1937 at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.):
``It is not the sense of the clause in the draft resolution dealing with releasing Party organizations from attention to economic trifles and intensifying Party political work that we should withdraw from economic work and economic leadership. The sense of that clause is merely not to permit in future that our Party organs should supplant economic organs, inclusive, and particularly so, __PRINTERS_P_241_COMMENT__ 16---263 241 of land organs, and deprive them of responsibility. It is therefore necessary to master the Bolshevik method of leadership of economic organs, which consists in rendering systematic aid to these organs, in systematically strengthening them, and in exercising leadership not over the heads of these organs but through them."
Can it be said, comrades, that this serious warning which Comrade Stalin gave our organizations has been acted upon everywhere? No, it .cannot, because in some of our organizations there are still two types of work .and two types of functionaries. Some try to do everything themselves, undertake everything, dig out all the petty details of economic and Soviet administration and bring them before the Party organization. As a result they are not in a position to do their job well and finish what they have begun, and, on top, they remove all responsibility from the Soviet economic organizations by their action. Another type of functionary employing another system of work thinks that leadership consists in giving general directions and thus leaves all concrete, day-to-day leadership to any Tom, Dick or Harry. I could cite quite a number of such instances from the work of various regional Party committees, but this is hardly necessary. Our task is definitely to eliminate these defects by reinforcing the personnel of the .Soviet and economic organs and giving .them correct leadership. In the fourth place, the most important factor of leadership in any work, now as before, is selection of personnel and keeping check on fulfilment. You know that Lenin emphatically insisted pn this as the main organizational requisite of correct leadership. It has remained the most important requisite to the present day. Comrade Stalin is constantly and persistently reminding us of the fact.
Can we say that attention to this principal organizational requisite of Party, Soviet and economic leadership has become part and parcel of the make-up of our workers in leading positions? No, comrades, we cannot.
Very often everything boils down to grinding out orders which repeat one another and the execution of which remains unchecked. Often the selection of personnel is done so thoughtlessly that there is a perpetual coming,and going of people succeeding each other because in many cases they prove to be square pegs in round holes.
It is therefore our task to eliminate these defects and really introduce a careful selection of personnel and check-up on fulfilment as the principal requisite of all our coming work.
242In the fifth place, it is true that the principal cadres of the enemy have been exposed and routed. But this must not dispose us to selfsatisfaction. No doubt such inclinations might arise among some of our people who think that all our enemies have been destroyed and that therefore we can now work in peace and quiet again. Such ideas would be dangerous if they took any hold in our organizations. Comrade Stalin has warned us that we are surrounded by a hostile capitalist world, and our people must never forget this warning. Those of the enemies who have not yet been exposed and others who may be smuggled into the country will evolve new and more subtle forms of .struggle. Where one method fails they will devise others. They are already using slander to discredit our new forces.
Our task is to continue to expose and paralyse all the enemy's attempts to commit acts of wrecking, to recruit people to their cause ,and disorganize our ranks.
In the sixth place, the Party organizations must not leave a single sphere of work, either political, economic or Soviet, without leadership and control. The lessons which we have learned show that in this respect many great mistakes were made in the past by our organizations, and the Central Committee has had to seriously correct certain regional and territorial committees.
For instance, it cannot be said that all is well with the leadership of such an important branch as state and cooperative trade which exists for the purpose of directly serving the needs of the population. Can .we boast that our Party organizations are making serious enough efforts to lead in this field, to lead the Party work in the offices in question? No, we have nothing to boast about in this respect.
Neither can we say that Party work .is being led satisfactorily in our universities, colleges and vocational training schools where hundreds of thousands of our -finest young people are being trained who, tomorrow, after completing their education, will be employed, often in leading positions, in the most varied branches of political, economic and cultural work. ,Yet our higher educational institutions and vocational training schools are attended by 1,553,000 people. In this respect our Party organizations have not yet effected a serious change after Comrade Stalin's warning.
Lastly, about Party work in agriculture. Undoubtedly, there has been an intensification of Party political work in agriculture during the period under review. The number of primary organizations and the Party membership have increased. However, we must still admit that our Party work in agriculture is weak and inadequate to cope __PRINTERS_P_243_COMMENT__ 16* 243 with the great problems which face us in the countryside and in agriculture generally.
It will be sufficient to refer to the unsatisfactory number of primary organizations and Communist Party members on the collective farms. In the past year we have had a certain increase in the number of Party members on the collective farms, but we cannot consider it a normal state of affairs when on 243,000 collective farms there are only 12,000 primary Party organizations with a total membership of 153,000, including candidate members.
In some parts the situation is particularly bad.
Take for instance the Byelorussian Republic. On 9,665 collective farms there are only 44 primary organizations with a total membership of 614.
In the Vologda Region there are 31 primary organizations with a membership of 442 to 5,970 collective farms. In the Perm Region there are only 16 primary organizations with a total membership of 274 to 3,314 collective farms.
At the same time there are republics and regions where the situation is much better. In Azerbaijan, for instance, there are 882 primary organizations with a Party membership of 14,500 to 3,677 collective farm,s. In Kazakhstan there are 1,239 primary organizations with a membership of 15,600 to 7,347 collective farms. In the Stalingrad Region there are 507 primary organizations with a Party membership of 5,286 to 1,655 collective farms. You see what a difference there is between some regions and others.
It is also desirable that the Y.G.L. pay serious attention to improving its work in the countryside. The Y.G.L. could have primary organizations in the great majority of the collective farms, if not in all, and yet more than 100,000 of the 243,000 collective farms have no primary Y.C.L. organizations.
Of course, comrades, it does not follow from this that our organizations must start a wide campaign for mechanically increasing the number of primary organizations and Party members on the collective farms, but we do have on the collective farms many politically advanced people who wish to become Party members, and in our work hereafter we are duty-bound to increase the number of Party members and of primary organizations in the collective farms. This will make it easier for us to perform our political work in the collective farms and to organize the leadership of the collective farms.
244 __ALPHA_LVL2__ Our Tasks in AgricultureComrade Stalin has set big tasks in the sphere of agriculture:
``We must develop further the advance scored in field cultivation and stock raising so as to achieve within the next three or four years an annual grain production of 8,000,000,000 poods with an average yield of 12 to 13 centners per hectare; we must effect an average increase of 30 to 35 per cent in the production of industrial crops, a 100 per cent increase in the number of sheep and hogs, an increase of about 40 per cent in the number of cattle and of about 35 per cent in the number of horses.''
These tasks can be fulfilled. I should like to dwell on the tremendous potentialities of agriculture in our country.
We must not underestimate the fact that public enemies of all complexions have undoubtedly done no little harm to the collective farms and state farms by their wrecking activities in the sphere of agriculture. Now it is clear that a widely conceived plan of acts of provocation had been devised and was being put into practice by the enemies of the people on the instructions of foreign espionage services. All means were resorted to to cause famine on our collective farms, to arouse discontent in our fair land. Words fail me adequately to describe the malice, the bestial savagery revealed in the methods which our enemies used in pursuance of their aims. Human history has hardly any parallel for the insidiousness and barbarity employed by the enemies of our people.
Wreckers in various guises infected great numbers of collectivefarm and state-farm cattle with glanders, anthrax and other infectious diseases and, through them, human beings as well. Instead of compounding medicines in the biological laboratories, the enemies, who had wormed their way also into these institutions, brewed poisons for the cattle, and created an artificial shortage of fodder so as to wreak havoc among our herds, with cattle dying in great numbers.
In order to disrupt the collective farms, the enemies, who managed to get seats on the land boards, destroyed farming machines in the machine and tractor stations and on the state farms. They encouraged shallow plowing so that the grain should be choked with weeds, did everything to hinder the harvesting of the crops and destroyed grain on the stalk, while what grain was garnered they allowed to go rotten in storage and infested it with ticks. It is difficult to enumerate all 245 the vile methods resorted to by the enemies of the people. Agriculture was evidently the principal target of their wrecking and diversive activities. But they miscalculated. They had to deal with tens of millions of collective farmers who did not want to go back to the old way of living. The enemies wanted to wreck the collective farms. They did not succeed. They were faced as if by a solid wall of vigorous collective farms, encountered the hatred of the whole people. What chance had these wretched insects against a giant like the Soviet people and their (Party? And the people shook off these insects, squashed them under-foot, and our collective farms emerged stronger than ever from their struggle with the wreckers.
What are the principal changes that have taken place in agriculture and in the collective farms in the period which has elapsed since the Seventeenth Congress of our Party? Comrade Stalin has spoken about them. The technical reconstruction of agriculture has been completed. The number of machine and tractor stations has increased over 100 per cent in this period. In the same period tractor capacity has multiplied three-fold. The number of harvester combines has increased sixfold. Three-quarters of the total plowed area of the collective farms is cultivated by tractors supplied by the machine and tractor stations. More than half of the sowing area on the collective farms is worked by tractor-driven seeders and harvester combines. There has been an improvement in the quality of soil cultivation on the collective farms. The area of fallow land has increased from 19,000,000 to 31,000,000 hectares, of lani plowed in autumn for spring sowing--- from 24,000,000 to 53,000,000 hectares, of land sown with high-- quality seeds---from 27,000,000 to 67,000,000 hectares, that is, the larger part of the entire sown area.
At the same time there has been a considerable increase in the output and productivity of agriculture, in crop yields and stock raising efficiency. There has been a radical improvement in the standard of living of the collective-farm peasantry. In comparison with 1934, the cash incomes of the collective farms have increased threefold. Average incomes of collective-farm households derived from work-day-units have increased 150 per pent in kind and 300 per cent in cash receipts. Cowless collective-farm households are a thing of the past to all intents and purposes. Prosperity in the collective farm has become a fact and what Comrade Stalin stated at the First AllUnion Congress of Collective-Farm Shock-Brigade Workers concerning prospects of a prosperous life has been borne out to the full.
There is no need to mention the tremendous changes which have 246 taken place in the collective-farm countryside in the political, cultural and social spheres. These radical changes in agriculture and the collective farms have been attended by the formation of an entirely new agricultural intelligentsia, a collective-farm intelligentsia, of new forces in agricultural production.
Tractor drivers and combine operators alone are 1,500,000 strong; agronomists, surveyors, zootechnicians and veterinary surgeons and assistants make a total of more than 300,000; then there are hundreds of thousands of collective-farm chairmen, brigade leaders and stockbreeders.
The collective farms have become the sole power and the sole master in the countryside. The collective-farm system; is firmly established. It has become part and parcel of peasant life, while life outside the collective farm has become unthinkable. Such are the results of the work of our Party in agriculture. In this way, comrades, enormous potential forces have been created for progress in the sphere of agriculture.
There is no need to prove that ours is the largest scale and the most mechanized agriculture and field cultivation in the world. Nevertheless, we have to admit that success or failure still depend to a great extent on the elements. Every year, in one part or another of the U.S.S.R., hundreds-of millions of poods of grain and fodder are lost to the collective and state farms as a result of parching winds and the lack iof moisture and rain. If the drought which affected the Volga region and some of the central regions- last year had occurred under the old system, when the peasants cultivated their land individually, there would certainly have been a terrible famine in the country and millions of peasants would have been ruined. This is out of question under the collective-farm system. In spite of the serious drought, thanks to socialized economy and the use of machinery in the cultivation of the soil, the collective farms as a whole reaped a sufficient harvest to see them through the difficult situation. Our country is so vast and our social system such that a crop failure in one republic or region is compensated by good harvests and assistance forthcoming elsewhere. Famine is impossible in our country.
Our Party and Government do not allow the collective farmers of stricken districts to starve. When last year a certain portion of the regions suffered a crop failure, the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars rendered assistance to the collective farms most affected by sending in 103,000,000 poods of grain, granting loans and rebates and allotting over 350,0100,000 rubles in cash.
247But, comrades, can we allow our large-scale mechanized agriculture to be blindly dependent on the elements? Is it not time we put an end to this blind dependence on the weather clerk?
We have all the conditions necessary, almost all the means required to enable us to farm, to cultivate pur soil efficiently, scientifically, to emancipate agriculture from its dependence on the elements: the best agricultural machines, large tracts of land and not diminutive plots, a socialized economy and enormous experience in this field. Many collective farms and machine and tractor stations in the drought areas have already solved this great problem in practice. I could cite living examples to prove that quite a few collective farms in the Saratov, Stalingrad, Moscow and other regions, which had comparatively poor harvests last year, did as well as or even better than usual, although, like the rest, they had had no rain all summer. The explanation is that they did not submit to the elements but declared war on them, and cultivated their fields along modern lines.
Here are several such collective farms: while in 1938 the average harvest collected in the Saratov region was 22 poods per hectare, the Red October Collective Farm in the Balakovo district harvested 75 poods of winter wheat, 60 poods of spring wheat, 76 poods of oats and 72 poods of barley per hectare; the O.G.P.U. Collective Farm had a wheat harvest of 70 poods per hectare; the Red Izhorets Collective Farm sowed 117 hectares of land with barley and harvested 100 poods per hectare.
And then there is the Stalingrad Region where the average harvest was 19 poods per hectare. In this region the Krupskaya Collective Farm, Nekhayevo district, reaped 72 poods of winter wheat per hectare, and 95 poods from the special seed sectors; the Kaganovich Collective Farm, Novo-Annenskaya district, harvested 86 poods of winter wheat per hectare.
In the Moscow region, where the average harvest of grain in 1938 was 33 poods per hectare, the Victory Collective Farm "in the Dimitrov district gathered an average of 106 poods of all grains and 136 poods of rye per hectare. The Stalin Constitution Collective Farm harvested 109 poods of wheat per hectare; the Stalin Collective Farm 173 poods of oats and the Unity Collective Farm 154 poods of barley per hectare. I have taken only two or three collective farms as examples in each of these regions; there were tens and hundreds like them in the regions affected by last year's drought. What measures did these collective farms take to overcome the drought? The O.G.P.IL Collective 248 Farm in the Balakovo district, Saratov region, did the following: It turned the stubble after reaping, all the autumn plowing was done before September 30th and to a depth of 18 to 20 centimetres, and the necessary measures were taken to retain the snow. The sowing was completed early in a minimum of time. Before sowing, the seeds were cleaned, disinfected and completely vernalized. Nothing complicated here in the way of applied agronomical science, as you see. And the collective farm got the better of the drought. Something along the same lines was done in the other collective farms. The experience thus gained the Central Committee of the Party and fhe Council of People's Commissars of the Union embodied in a decision on combating the drought in the south-east. But it seems that this decision has not been carried out with the necessary determination by our People's Commissariat of Agriculture and the Regional Party Committees concerned.
Comrade Stalin put forward the task of raising the gross harvest to 8,000,000,000 poods in the next few years, that is, 13 centners to the hectare. This figure is feasible but success can only be assured if our organizations work hard, and, above all, eliminate the losses which many machine and tractor stations and collective farms incur as a result of usually starting their sowing at least 2 or 3 days behind schedule, and, to make matters worse, letting the spring sowing drag on for 16 or 17 days instead of getting it through in 5 or 6 days. In the case of winter sowing, our machine and tractor stations as a rule do not keep to any strict schedule either for the beginning of the sowing or for the end of the sowing, and there were cases of sowing going on until the frost set in. And what is the result when the sowing is started 2 or 3 days late or is allowed to drag on ? It means losing from one-quarter to one-third of the harvest.
Many machine and tractor stations and collective farms lose part of the harvest as a result of poor preparations for the harvest, and of dragging it on for a month or even longer. Just by eliminating these two defects we could obtain at least several hundred millions of poods of Additional grain and fodder. This is the purpose of the decisions of the Central Committee of the Party.
The vast possibility of increasing the yield of our grain and industrial crops has been demonstrated by thousands of collective farms, tens of thousands of brigades and teams. If we examine the harvest collected by 187,000 collective farms in 1938 we find that 58,000 collective farms already had a yield of 66 poods and over per hectare, 35,000 of them with a yield of 78 poods and over, that is, 13 centners and over, whereas the average grain harvest in the U.S.S.R. as a whole 249 was 9.3 centners or 56 poods per hectare. But some districts as a whole got even better results: in the Russkaya-Polyana and Shenbakul districts of the Omsk region the yield per hectare was 123 poods; in the Lopatin district, Chelyabinsk region---125 poods; in the Yampol district, Vinnitsa region---129 poods; in the Kellerovo and Petropavlovsk districts of the North Kazakhstan region---140 poods per hectare. Taking collective farms separately, the highest yield was 158 poods per hectare, secured among others, by the Litvinov Collective Farm in the Sverdlovsk region.
The yield was higher still if we take individual brigades. For instance, Comrade Soldatov's brigade in the collective farm named "Political Department," located in the Melekess district, Kuibyshev region, had an average yield of 225 poods of grain per hectare. Comrade Ledovsky's brigade in the Krassin Collective Farm of the Adygei Autonomous Region had a yield of 246 poods per hectare.
The yields were bigger still if we take separate groups of collective farmers working in teams. The team led by the woman collective farmer Sergeyeva of the collective farm named "Political Department" in the Altai Territory, received 438 poods of wheat per hectare on a 4 hectare section, and 328 poods per hectare on a 10 hectare section. Comrade Papanko's team of the Red Partisan Collective Farm got a yield of 457 poods of spring wheat from one hectare and 353 poods per hectare on a 15 hectare section. Comrade Rakitin's team of the Novy Charysh Collective Farm in the Beloglazovo district, Altai Territory, obtained a yield of 481 poods of wheat .per hectare in 1937. The teams led by the famous Altai Territory collective farmers, Yefremov and Chumanov, obtained in 1936 from 213 to 372 poods per hectare. This came as a complete surprise to local agronomists. In the next year these and many other teams in the Beloglazovo district obtained the unprecedented yield of.427-457 poods per hectare. In 1937 Comrade Chumanov secured a yield of 512 poods per hectare. There were 4,300 of these record-making teams in the Altai Territory alone in 1938. I may say that the life and soul of this movement, its initiator, was the Beloglazovo District Committee of the Communist Party and its first secretary. This shows what can be done in any district if our district committees have the will and the makings.
Such is the situation with grain.
Now let us examine the state of affairs in the sphere of cotton growing. While the average crop in the U.S.S.R. in 1938 was 12.9 centners per hectare, some districts achieved the following crop figures: the Geok-Tepe and Farab districts of the Turkmen S.S.R. 250 picked 23.8 centners per hectare; the Stalinabad district, Tajik S.S.R. 27.8 centners per hectare; the Isbaskent district, Ferghana region---33 centners per hectare. Collective farms taken separately have secured much bigger cotton crops. The Karl Marx Collective Farm in the Turkmen S.S.R. picked 43 centners per hectare; the Chapayev Collective Farm in the Turkmen S.S.R. picked 43 centners per hectare. Taking separate brigades, the biggest crop was 91 centners per hectare, the record made by Comrade Kurbanov's brigade of the Thalmann Collective Farm in the Uzbek S.S.R. But the cotton teams separately secured even bigger crop yields. For instance, the' team led by Comrade R. Abduraimov of the Voroshilov Collective Farm in the Kirghiz S.S.R. picked 108 centners per hectare; the team led by the collective farmer Allanazar Khudayev, a member of the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R., on the Stalin Collective Farm in the Sverdlovsk district of the Uzbek S.S.R., grew 125 centners per hectare; the team led by Comrade A. Tashbayev in the Ferghana region grew 130 centners per hectare; the team led by Comrade Aliyeva of the Litvinov Collective Farm, Azerbaijan S.S.R., 151 centners per hectare. The team led by Comrade Gojar Mustafa-kyzy of the Voroshilov Collective Farm in the Azerbaijan S.S.R. grew 151 centners per hectare. That is how we stand with cotton.
Now see what our flax farms are doing. While the average crop in the U.S.S.R. as a whole in 1938 was 2.7 centners per hectare, there are some districts where it was twice as much. For instance, the Krasny Kholm district of the Kalinin region grew 4.6 centners per hectare; the Kamensk district of the Kalinin region grew 5.3 centners per hectare.
In teams separately: the team led by Comrade Vozhayeva of the Kaganovich Collective Farm in the Kirov region grew 12.8 centners of flax fibre per hectare; the team led by Comrade Kandereva of the Young Comlmunard Collective Farm in the Chausy district of the Byelorussian S.S.R. grew 14 centners per hectare; the team led by Comrade Filkina of the First of May Collective Farm in the Mstislavl district of the Byelorussian S.S.R. grew 17.6 centners; the team led by Comrade Baranovskaya of the Thalmann Collective Farm in the Emilchino District of the Zhitomir region in 1936 grew 14 centners, in 1937 20.6 centners, and in 1938 21.75 centners per hectare.
The same with sugar beet. While the average harvest in 1938 in the U.S.S.R. as a whole was 141 centners per hectare, in some districts the yield was much higher. For example, the Shirokoye district in the 251 Dnepropetrovsk region grew 335 centners per hectare, the Kant district of the Kirghiz S.S.R. grew 361 centners and the collective farm bearing the name of the "Line of the G.C.," in the Kalinin district of the Kirghiz S.S.R. grew 442 centners per hectare. In the case of brigades separately: the brigade led by Comrade Geta of the Zgurovka state sugar beet farm in the Poltava region, after obtaining a yield of 455 centners per hectare, obtained 545 centners in 1938. The brigade led by Comrade Mamunov of the Sozialey Collective Farm, Kant district, Kirghiz S.S.R. averaged 534 centners per hectare. :Some teams exceeded a thousand centners per hectare; the team led by Comrade S. D. Okhot of the Red Champion Collective Farm in the Vinnitsa region obtained a yield of 835 centners per hectare in 1936, and in 1938 1,062 centners per hectare; the team led by Comrade Pilipenko of the Red Ukraine Collective Farm in the Lozovaya district, Kharkov region, obtained a yield of <i700 centners of sugar beet per hectare in 1936, and 1,049 centners per hectare in 1938; the team led by Comrade Pf ovolotskaya of the Mikoyan -State Farm, Kirovograd region, reaped 1,103 centners per hectare in 1938.
I could cite hundreds and thousands of such examples. Here are real reserves for you. Just think how fraught with possibilities is the difference between the 56 poods average harvest of grain in the country as a whole and the 512 poods per hectare which our leading agriculturists already have to their credit! Between the average of 12.9 centners of cotton and their 151 centners! Between the yield of 2.7 centners of flax per hectare in the U.S.S.R. as a whole and their 21 centners. The same with sugar beet. What a mine of possibilities and reserves in agriculture is being brought to light by our foremost workers in agriculture!
Who are these people? Are their achievements accidental?
They are just ordinary neople, comrades, of middle peasant, labouring and poor peasant stock, and, as Comrade Stalin said of the Stakhanovites, these are just plain folk, modest, laying no claim to the laurels of national celebrity. These are people who have been studying the nature of plant-life in practice, in their day's work, who have mastered the science of agriculture, are promoting it, creating totally new standards of output and new principles of farming. These people have secured such good results for their labour because they love their work.
Bear in mind that they are no longer isolated cases. There are tens of thousands of them and their like, pupils of our Party. Some of them are members of the Supreme Soviets, many have been decorated 252 by the Government for their meritorious services. The appearance of these people is a result of the success and the consolidation of the collective farms, a result of the fact that our agriculture has been equipped with first-class machines, a result of the tremendous labour of our Party and the constant interest which Comrade Stalin takes in agriculture. (Applause.)
What is the secret of their success? What do our foremost agriculturist use in order to get such excellent harvests? It is possible to demonstrate to you the various measures employed by collective farms, brigades and teams, but I can give it to you in a nutshell.
First, our leading agriculturists use agronomical methods in their totality, [in coordination, without disconnecting one from the other.
Second, their measures consist in fighting for a maximum of moisture by snow retention measures, by early autumn ploughing (which they never fail to do) for (spring sowing, by ploughing for fallows, by harrowing not only winter-sown but also spring-sown land in order to remove the crust that forms after rain. I must say, comrades, that the latter is undoubtedly quite a new practice which has been introduced by our foremost farmers.
Third, in order to fight weeds and promote soil conservation, they introduce crop rotation, deep ploughing, stubble turning, weeding and cleaning the grain seed.
Fourth, they sow early and in a minimum, of time. As a rule the sowing is done with seeds vernalized according to the method introduced by Academician Lysenko.
Further, our leading farmers have an entirely new method of sowing, that is, they strive to scatter the seeds more rationally, making a clean break with all traditions as regards the quantity sown per unit of area. They are not satisfied to let the weight of seeds per unit of sowing area be the sole determining factor in fixing sowing standards. They also take into consideration the number of seeds required per unit of sowing area in order to avoid crowding, the result of planting too closely, and yet farm the land with the utmost intensivity. Some of our best farmers, dissatisfied with the design of our wide seeders, employ cross-sowing in order to use the area to better advantage and distribute the plants more rationally.
In the struggle for good harvests, our leading agriculturists use manure and chemical fertilizer in all cases. Something quite new in this respect that has been introduced by our leading agriculturists, a method previously unknown to science, is the feeding of plants with 253 fertilizer after the sowing. Lastly, they gather in the harvest in good time.
Some of them are adopting more advanced methods, such as watering the fields under grain. This was done, for instance, by the brigade led by Comrade Oleinikov of the Red Partisan Collective Farm, .Stalingrad region, which obtained a yield of 445 poods of grain per hectare in the dry year of 1938.
But it is very important that our foremost workers in agriculture and collective farms do not work by set patterns, or apply scientific agricultural methods mechanically, but adapt them to the local soil and the specific climatic conditions.
This, comrades, is the substance of the methods used by our leading agriculturists to secure record harvests. Even so they themselves say that they are not doing all they could, that they could do more. That is why it is no accident if they get good harvests from the same land that yields little to others. The fact is they already control the harvest yield and receive year in and year out approximately what they plan to get.
The question arises, is there anything in their methods unusual or out "of the reach of other collective farms and collective farmers? No, all these methods are quite within the reach of every collective farm and collective farmer.
I must apologize, comrades, for having expatiated at such length on these questions, for having gone into such detail to elucidate them, but I wanted you leaders of Party organizations, secretaries of district and regional Party committees and other Party officials to see, not from general principles but from a marshalling of the facts, from the example of the work which has been done by tens of thousands of live people, by our collective farms, what a remarkable, healthy and all-conquering young movement is developing in our collective-farm countryside and what enormous possibilities there are for a sweeping improvement in the productivity of agriculture in our country. ( Applause.)
You see, comrades, how all limits, all theories, all arguments about fertile and unfertile lands are being reduced to nought by the persistent efforts of our leading collective farms and collective farmers. You see how they, these modest people, have called upon science in the course of their practical work, and built up a comprehensive scientific method of extracting ,good harvests from the soil and of emancipating agriculture completely from the harmful influences of the elements.
What I have said regarding the vast possibilities of increasing the 254 productivity of the soil also applies to the tremendous latent reserves which have accumulated already in the mechanization of agriculture. This must be particularly stressed because some of our regional Party committees have a one-sided approach to this question. They clamour for more harvester combines and more tractors, losing sight of the fact that it is their duty to get more service out of the agricultural machines already on hand, to follow the lead of the foremost tractor drivers and combine operators who are showing what enormous reserves and possibilities there are for increasing the performance of tractors and combines.
Here are just a few figures in brief. As against the 1938 average of 411 hectares cultivated per wheel tractor and 1,117 hectares per C.T.Z. caterpillar-tractor in the U.S.S.R. as a whole, the average for the Crimean A.S.S.R. was 693 hectares per wheel tractor and 1,726 per C.T.Z. tractor; and the average for the Tatar A.S.S.R. was 610 hectares per wheel tractor and 1,596 hectares per C.T.Z. tractor. In the Aktanysh machine and tractor station (M.T.S.) (Tatar S.S.R.), the average area cultivated per wheel tractor was 1,296 hectares; in the Rossosh M.T.S. (Voronezh region) 1,306 hectares per wheel tractor and 2,745 hectares per C.T.Z.; in the Red Army M.T.S. (Crimean A.S.S.R.)---1,095 hectares per wheel tractor, and 2,066 hectares per C.T.Z.
The use-factor is even higher if we take individual tractor drivers and brigade leaders. For instance, the/brigade leader Pirozhkov of the Muravlyanka M.T.S. in the Ryazan region cultivated 5,100 hectares on a C.T.Z. tractor; Comrade Bakholdina, a woman tractor brigade leader employed at the Talovo M.T.S. in the Altai Territory cultivated 5,200 hectares on a C.T.Z. tractor, the brigade leader Bortakovsky employed at the Mozhary M.T.S. in the Ryazan region cultivated 5,700 hectares on a C.T.Z. tractor, that is, more than five times the U.S.S.R. average for C.T.Z. tractors. Wheel tractor records tell a similar story.
In the case of combines, which, taking the Union as a whole, averaged 301 hectares per .season, the general average of the VolgaGerman Republic is already 398 hectares. Taking machine and tractor stations separately, the Stalin M.T.S. in the Krasnodar Territory averaged 507 hectares per combine, the Novo-Annenskaya M.T.S. in the Stalingrad region, 550 hectares. Champion combine operators, like Sviridov of the Krasnokholm M.T.S. (Chkalov region), harvested 3,675 hectares on a tandem of two Stalinets combines.
While the average for the Chkalov region was 378 hectares per combine, the brothers Oskin, driving a tandem of two Stalinets 255 combines, harvested in one season neither more nor less than 5,238 hectares, that is, as much as 14 combines averaged in this region.
And if we translate this into terms of horse-power and man-power, we find that the brothers Oskin with their two combines did the work of 1,637 men, 373 horses, 25 reapers, 25 threshers, 25 winnowing machines and 40 sorting machines, or 3,323 men if the harvesting had been done by hand as it used to be. You see what miracles are performed by people who have mastered technique. (Applause.)
You will now realize, comrades, what potentialities in the employment of agricultural mechanization have been unearthed by our leading tractor drivers and combine operators.
Now, what is required in order to overcome the harmful effects of the elements on our agriculture, in order to gain the mastery over nature and free ourselves from the whims of the weather; what is required in order to considerably increase the yield of our fields on the state and collective farms?
First, we must do a minimum of what is already being done by our leading collective farms, state farms and the foremost workers in agriculture, that is, cultivate the soil by modern methods. As you know, the Central Committee has specified these requirements in its decisions concerning the districts susceptible to drought and the work of the machine and tractor stations. And they must be carried out.
Second, we must finally give serious attention to the matter of introducing proper systems of crop rotation, and display more boldness in carrying into effect what Comrade Stalin said as far back as the Seventeenth Party Congress. In this respect the People's Commissariat of Agriculture has been very half-hearted, or, rather, completely inactive. Incidentally it must be said that about 15 per cent of our collective and state farms \have already introduced proper crop rotation without waiting for signs of life from our People's Commissariat of Agriculture and some of our regional and territorial Party committees.
Third, we must boost the use of fertilizer all we can. Our leading agriculturists are proving in practice the enormous extent to which harvests depend on fertilizing the soil and feeding the plants. At the same time we must admit that, taking our country as a whole, soil fertilization is still practised only to a minor degree, although our farms are receiving four times as much fertilizer as in 1932. We must demand that the new People's Commissariat of the Chemical Industry and its personnel secure a more rapid increase of output and higher productivity in the manufacture of chemical fertilizer. In order to 256 avoid long hauls of mineral fertilizer, we must accelerate the development of all newly worked deposits, such as the potassium salt deposits in the Saratov region, which are said to be very rich, and the deposits of phosphorites in South Kazakhstan, which would make it possible to supply all the cotton fields in Central Asia with sufficient fertilizer.
At the same time we must put an end to the intolerable situation of state and collective farms allowing enormous quantities of manure to go to waste by not depositing it in the fields, despite the shortage of fertilizer, while chemical fertilizers often lie at the railway yards and are spoiled by rain as a result of the failure of district authorities and collective-farm managements to settle for them in time and remove them to the fields.
Fourth, in order to promote efficiency in agriculture we must press into service agricultural science with all its numerous research and experimental facilities. Among our men of science there are remarkable pioneers, promoters of scientific thought like Lysenko, Williams, Tsitsin and others. We have thousands of splendid experimenters, in the machine and tractor stations, collective farms and experimental stations, who have mastered their branch of science ,and are developing science further. If we could compile even a tenth part of this wealth of experience, we could fill several excellent textbooks and handbooks for our agronomists, collective-farm chairmen, M.T.S. managers and brigade leaders. Unfortunately, the People's Commissariat of Agriculture pays no attention to this matter and our students for the most part are obliged to use out-of-date textbooks and study obsolete standards of scientific farming.
This, comrades, is what we must do in order to emancipate agriculture from blind dependence on the elements and extract good harvests from our collective and state farms. It is not, of course, a question of bringing the general harvest up. to the level of individual records; it is rather a question of increasing our harvest by 50 per cent in the next three or four years, which will give us an extra three or four thousand million poods of gross crop returns.
Increasing our harvest yields, obtaining good yields regularly year by year, will solve the problem of making rapid headway in livestock farming. Comrade Stalin has already drawn our attention to the great importance of this vital branch of agriculture. From the figures which he quoted we see that we have been able during the period under review not only to halt the decline but to secure a considerable __PRINTERS_P_257_COMMENT__ 17---263 257 increase in livestock, but we must admit nevertheless that the problems of livestock farming are still far from solved.
What is hindering the advance of livestock farming? First, it is obvious that many of our collective and state farms are still making poor efforts to create a fodder base. Second, stock raising has not been receiving the necessary attention or proper leadership either from the People's Commissariat of Agriculture or from numerous regional Soviet and Party organizations, 'although in quite a number of republics and regions things are going well in this respect. Quite a number of collective and state farms have been able to increase the number of cattle from year to year. There are tens of thousands of collective farmers, men and women, who have obtained amazing results in the natural increase of cattle and in milk yield because they tend the animals properly.
What is needed? Much could be said in answer to this question, but the main thing is to stop underestimating the importance of stock breeding, to stop the habit of "muddling through." As Comrade Stalin said, stock raising must be taken in hand by the 'whole Party, all our personnel, Party and non-Party, bearing in mind that the problem of stock raising is now one of the prime problems in agriculture. We are in a position to handle all the problems of stock raising and foddering and we must do so. We must make all the collective farmers, especially those tending cattle, interested in increasing collective-farm herds, preserving them and increasing their productivity. How is this to be done? Our foremost collective farms have shown us a wealth of examples on this score.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Discipline and the Question of Organizing Work on theI should like to dwell briefly on the organizational questions of the collective farms, because it is not enough to speak on the science of agriculture as such. We have also to think of the economic aspect, of how work is organized on the collective farims, upon which the use of agricultural science itself depends. The decisive importance of organization in collective farming and collective-farm work can be seen from the thousands of greatly different results in harvests, animal husbandry and incomes of collective farmers, obtained on neighbouring collective farms differently run. I will give you a couple of examples. Take the Freedom/ Collective Farm in the Orel region, the chairman of which is Comrade Yevsyukov: work on the collective farm is well organized, the average yield of grain! in 1938 was 13 centners to 258 the hectare, the work-day-unit paid from 4 to 5 kilograms of grain and 1 ruble 40 kopeks cash. The collective farm has a dairy department, in which the average yield of milk per cow totals 2,500 litres. Now take the Sixth Congress of Soviets Collective Farm next door: the collective farm is managed badly, the organization of labour is bad, the yield of grain in 1938 was 6 centners per hectare, the workday-unit paid 800 grams of grain and 84 kopeks cash, while the yield of milk per cow was 900 litres.
Again, take the Progress Collective Farm in the Yekalerinovo district, Chkalov region: the organization of work and the discipline are not bad, the collective farm received a harvest of 8.4 centners per hectare and the work-day-unit paid 5.6 kilograms of grain and 93 kopeks cash. The quota of deliveries to the state was fulfilled, in addition to which the collective farm sold the state 800 centners of grain; the seeds were all binned and prepared for the sowing, the average yield of milk per stall-fed cow was 1,448 litres. Now take the neighbouring collective farm called the First Mikhailovka: the yield was low---4.3 centners per hectare, the plan of autumn plowing for spring sowing was carried out only 50 per cent, the sowing was done slowly, the work-day-unit paid 800 grams of grain and 20 kopeks in cash, the average yield of milk per cow was 962 litres. General organization and labour discipline were very lax. In 1938 'they had 3 different chairmen.
Such examples of the direct influence of collective-farm conditions on the results could be quoted by the hundred. That is why questions of the organization of work and management are becoming more and more urgent on the collective farms. What are these questions? First, to make the collective farmers interested in securing good harvests and fighting for efficient stock raising. This aspect of the case decides everything. In those collective farms where it is taken care of, the situation is incomparably better. Actually, the difficulty of further increasing labour productivity in the collective farms is due mainly to equalitarianism, under which the value of the work-day-unit is independent of the results of the harvest and the increase in the productivity of the animal husbandry, and is further due to depersonalization, under which the collective farmers working in large brigades are not held personally responsible for the quantity and quality of their work.
Is it not clear, comrades, that these elements of equalitarianism and depersonalization of labour on the collective farms must be eradicated, the sooner the better?
__PRINTERS_P_259_COMMENT__ 17* 259How are we to explain the brilliant records and the achievements of our best collective farms and collective farmers in field cultivation and animal husbandry? By the fact that the work performed by each separate collective farmer or team is not depersonalized but is expressed in the final accounting for their work, by the fact that the work of each individual collective farmer or small group of collective farmers is taken note of and encouraged in a material way. The collective farmers want the results of their work to be seen not only in the large number of work-day-units they have earned but also in the level of the harvest obtained and the productivity of the cattle achieved. They want their labour to be given full credit, then they will do their level best.
This means that the more the work on the collective farm is individualized, that is, performed by separate teams or collective farmers, and the greater the material encouragement of their labour, the more efficient it will be as regards crop yields and stock raising. Quite a number of collective farms have solved this question for themselves, and did so correctly.
You know, comrades, that the cotton situation in our country a few years ago was very unsatisfactory. The crops were poor. The Central Committee and Comrade Stalin intervened. As soon as bonuses were introduced for high yields and the farmers adopted the method of organizing labour in teams and small brigades, things took a turn for the better. The cotton crop increased from 13,000,000 centners in 1933 to 27,000,000 in 1938, and the yield of cotton increased from 6 centners to 12.9 centners per hectare.
The very same with flax. The Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars took a decision analogous to their decision on cotton and the situation began to improve. Thus, in 1938, in spite of the drought, the plan of flax deliveries to the state was fulfilled in all regions. The same was the case with sugar beet.
But the method of organizing work in teams has proved its worth not only in the case of industrial crops. Many collective farms adopted the method of forming teams inside field-cultivation and graingrowing brigades.
Let me refer you to Comrade Kostenko, chairman of the Seventeenth Party Congress Collective Farm in the Staro-Shcherbinovskaya district, Krasnodar Territory, a member of the Supreme Soviet of the R.S.F.S.R. "On our collective farm, teams of nine or ten workers have been organized in the field brigades, each team being assigned a definite plot of land where it goes through the whole process of 260 preparing for the sowing and looks after the crops. In this way every piece of sown land in our collective farm has actually a master of its own who takes care of it. The results of the harvest are reckoned by teams. The collective farmers in each team know each other better, see how each member of the team is working and vie with one another for the best record. While previously, before teams were organized, from 17 to 25 members out of the 50 in a brigade reported for work regularly, now, under the team system, 45-47 report regularly. Breaches of labour discipline have become rare and the collective farm gets good results. We got an average yield of 112 poods of cereals per hectare.''
This was the experience also of the Yefremov teams in Siberia. The conclusion to be drawn is, for one thing, that we must resolutely adopt the team system on the collective farms and in brigades, and the system of paying for work and bonuses on an individual and team basis, and in accordance with the results of the harvest.
``For another thing, we must help the collective farms adopt proper standards of performance. The standards fixed by the People's Commissariat of Agriculture in 1933 are obviously out of date, for vast changes have taken place on the collective farms since then, and, in addition, there is great diversity in the application of these standards on the collective farms. We must help to work out proper standards, such as have stood the test of experience on the best collective farms.
Work performed on the collective farms should be paid not only in accordance with the number of work-day-units earned, but also in accordance with the quality of the work done by the respective brigades, teams or collective farmers individually as shown by the harvests obtained. The collective farmers whose duties consist of tending cattle should also be paid by results---the manner in which the cattle was kept and its productivity. The bonus system is applied far too sparingly on the collective farms and state farms to further these ends.
For a third thing: the vast majority of our conscientious and diligent collective farmers are raising their voices more and more insistently for an improvement in labour discipline on the collective farms. This is due to the progress made by the collective farms, to the public spirit which is gaining firmer ground.among a definite majority of the collective farmers, and, apparently, to- the fact that there is still a certain proportion of collective farmers who parade the name but neglect the socialized work on the collective farms, are always looking for loopholes and additional earnings, boosting their personal 261 husbandry by increasing their cattle and individual plots to an excessive degree. It is quite obvious that the collective farms have the right to demand a certain minimum of labour on the collective farm from every one of its members. There are certain obligations attached to membership in an agricultural artel and not only the right to call yourself a collective farmer and the other rights that go-with it. No one may call himself a collective farmer if he has his own way with his collective farm and only earns 30 or 40 work-day-units just to keep up appearances. The collective farm is entitled to restrict the right of such delinquents to use collective-farm horses, and may demand that the authorities deprive them of the various rebates in taxes and deliveries in kind to the government which collective farmers enjoy.
In this respect we must support the demands of the vast majority of the collective farmers who are working honestly and conscientiously. We must meet these healthy demands and make serious efforts to organize labour on collective farms in conformity with.the experience arid the demands of the foremost collective farms and their members. At the same time the collective farms can and must grant Comrade Stalin's request that our industries be given an annual contingent of 1,500,000 young collective farmers. I think there can be no doubt that our collective farms and collective farmers will respond heartily to Comrade Stalin's appeal. (Applause.)
Now a few words about distortions of the collective-farm rules. There was a time when our collective farms were too weak to supply all the needs of the collective farmers from the produce of socialized husbandry. At that time it was rightly stated that the collective farmers should be allowed to have cattle and adjoining plots for their private use. Now that this has been done and all the collective farmers have been given cows and plots of land for their own use, and the collective farms are firmly on their feet, we must put the emphasis on strengthening and extending the socialized, collective farming, and increase its contribution to the incomes of the collective farmers and its share in taking care of their requirements. The correct combination of personal interests and public interests on the collective farms .remains the fundamental principle of the collective-farm system, but the personal husbandry of the collective farm households must assume more and more a strictly subsidiary character, while the socialized husbandry of the collective farms, being the main thing, must grow.
Further improvement in the living standards and the prosperity of the collective farmers can be secured only by increasing the socialized husbandry of the collective farm and not by increasing out 262 of all proportion the personally owned livestock and personally used plots of land of the. separate households. Wrong methods of approach and wrong practises on the part of certain leaders of local Party and Soviet organizations have led to serious infractions of the collectivefarm rules. This is true to such an extent that in some places the personal husbandry of the collective-farm households has begun to outgrow the socialized husbandry of the collective farms and is becoming the principal husbandry, while the collective husbandry, on the contrary, is becoming a mere sideline; On some collective farms the proper proportion between the two husbandries has not been maintained. There were cases where incomes received from such personal enterprises as market gardening, fruit growing, the sale of milk and meat, etc., began to exceed the incomes received for workday-units, which inevitably had a .bad effect on the state of labour discipline on the collective farms.
With the unanimous support of all collective farms and the vast majority of the collective farmers, these anomalies have been largely, but not yet completely, eliminated.
What lesson must we learn from this? We must be real leaders and helpers of the collective farms and not just bystanders. We must not come to a standstill on the ground we have gained but must enhance the strength of the collective farms and elevate them to a higher plane' of social economy.
The proportion of socially earned incomes from work-day-units and the contribution of the socialized husbandry to the livelihood of the collective farmers must grow, while the proportion of privately earned income must relatively decrease. Many collective farms are already following this course with success. Such are the organizational questions of the collective farms.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Leadership in the Sphere of Agriculture and theComrades, the conclusion to be drawn from all that I have said shpuld, in my opinion, be the following: as a result of the enormous labours performed in collectivizing the countryside, we have the full right, without boasting, to say that the Party of the Bolsheviks has done everything, has prepared everything for an unparalleled surge forward in the productivity of agriculture. Large-scale socialized farming has come into being. The collective farms have established themselves irrevocably, and have become the sole masters in the 263 countryside. The kulaks have been eliminated as a class. The individual farmer has lost all importance as an independent economic factor and is standing somewhere at the crossroads between the collective farm and the factory gates. The technical reconstruction, the equipment of agriculture with new machines, has, in the main, been completed. We have accumulated ,a wealth of diversified experience in obtaining good yields from the soil and large returns from stock raising, especially milk, also in the exemplary organization of labour on the collective farms. Lastly, we have on the collective farms fine, healthy sentiments and the remarkable movement of the rural Stakhanovites, the foremost collective farmers.
Should all this not suffice, comrades, to bring about an unparalleled revolution in the productivity of our agriculture? But this revolution must first be organized. It will not come by itself, but will be brought about if we observe the following basic condition: The Party and Soviet organizations of our republics, regions and districts must radically reorganize their methods of leadership in agriculture.
Some comrades think that everything in the garden is lovely and results will come by themselves. Organizations and leaders who think so are often taken unawares and get into a mess. Such, for example, was the case with the Party organizations of Chelyabinsk, Novosibirsk and Omsk in connection with the bumper crop of 1938.
One can have an abundance of fine machines, good workers and even a good yield^^1^^, and yet fail disgracefully. There are plenty of examples of this in the work of certain regional and territorial Party committees, machine and tractor stations and collective farms.
Listen to what Comrade Stalin said on this subject in 1933 at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P,S.U.(B.):
261``We all rejoice at the fact that the collective form of farming has become the dominant form..... But not all of us understand that this circumstance does not diminish but increase our cares and responsibilities in regard to developing agriculture. ... The transition to collective farming, as the predominant form of farming, does not diminish but increase our cares in regard to agriculture, does not diminish but increase the leading role of the Communists in the advance of agriculture. Letting things take their own course is now more dangerous than ever for the development of agriculture. Letting things take their own course now may prove fatal to the whole cause.''
What are the principal shortcomings of the present leadership in agriculture as exercised by some of our organizations? They consist in the fact that many regional committees and territorial committees lead agriculture by fits and starts, by means of short-lived campaigns and not in a business-like manner. The mistake which some of our Party and Soviet leaders make is that they do not study agriculture, and think that everything will work out right of its own accord, without their delving into the essentials of the technique and organization of collective and state farming. They fail to draw upon and utilize the vast experience of the foremost workers in agriculture, they lead in a general way, but give no concrete, constant, day-to-day guidance. They do not make it their job to select cadres in the collective farms, machine and tractor stations and state farms.
Is it not time, comrades, that we put an end to this kind of leadership and became real leaders of the collective farms and state farms, did things in a business-like way, and not step into action only when emergencies, such as breakdowns, occur?
If so, we must put an end to the entirely uncalled for practice of non-intervention in the internal affairs of the collective farms and replace it with the practice of constantly caring for and helping the collective farmers. We must understand that the collective farms require serious leadership and look to us to get it.
We must put an end to the belittling of the role of organization in collective farming, to the underestimation of the importance of accounting, bookkeeping, etc.
We must have no more of the flippant attitude toward the executive personnel of the machine and tractor stations, and of the collective farms and state farms. The practice of frequently changing state-farm directors, M.T.S. managers, collective-farm chairmen and brigade leaders must terminate. Effective aid must be given the collective farms in the selection of suitable leaders and their political education.
We must also^^1^^ cure some of our Party and Soviet bodies of the habit of bossing the collective farms instead of organizing them, and of the habit of disregarding collective-farm democracy---the principle of election by and accountability to the collective-farm membership.
We must effectively strengthen and reorganize the work of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture and its local bodies. At present, in the majority of cases, they are offices for planning, not managing. We must put an end to the bureaucracy and old traditions in these places and bring in more of the foremost agriculturists now in the 262 ranks, draw on them from the collective farms, the M.T.S. and our universities and colleges.
We must make it our earnest business to lead the state farms. As things are now, many regional Party committees have virtually elim* inated themselves from leadership over the state farms, This is due to no small extent to the system, pursued by the wreckers formerly in charge of the People's Commissariat of State Farms, of managing the state farms direct from this commissariat. The evident purpose of this erroneous practice was to sidetrack the regional Party committees in the question of leading and controlling the state farms. The state farms are a big thing with us. We-have 4,000 of them. Their contribution to stock raising and the harvest of grain is very considerable, and, what is more, they play an important part as model agricultural enterprises, which is what they must be.
We must rouse the cooperative societies and local industry from their inattention and make them develop the local production and supply of articles in mass demand by the collective farms and the collective farmers, like lumber, iron, nails, hardware, roofing and furniture. They must remember that the demands of the collective farmers increase. The collective farmers want to live better and can afford to live better. We must bear in mind that the incomes of the collective farms are increasing and will continue to increase more and more. It is clear that if the collective farms and collective farmers cannot get the benefit of their incomes, interest in productive labour will decline. The fault here is not so much the shortage of lumber and metal as lack of attention.
Lastly, we must help the collective farms, state farms and machine and tractor stations to develop still wider the movement of the foremost collective farmers and disseminate their experience and achievements throughout the land.
Comrades, we can say point-blank that all the questions of crop rotation, of more scientific methods of agriculture---sowing in time, harvesting in time, improving stock breeding, organizing work on the collective farms and many other questions---can be easily solved if the Party and Soviet leaders of the districts, regions and republics take serious thought and really make it their business to lead agriculture, really put themselves at the head of the movement of the most enterprising agriculturists on the collective farms and state farms. Then we shall have everything we set out to accomplish.
There can be no doubt that the Bolshevik Party will honourably discharge also these great tasks relating to agriculture. (Applause.)
266In his admirable report, Comrade Stalin has given us a clear and concise summing-up of results, has mapped out the work of our Party for the coming period. The whole Party and the whole country have received explicit answers to all questions.
Comrades, we are" faced with a big and responsible task, the task of effecting the new and even more remarkable transition to the next, a higher stage, the stage of communist society. So far we are having to build this communist society in hostile surroundings, encompassed by the capitalist world, which creates extra difficulties for us that will not be experienced by the working people in other countries when the international socialist revolution will be triumphant.
But we with our new, fresh forces can cheerfully face the future, because our multi-national people is more firmly united politically and morally than ever before, because we have the invincible Bolshevik Party which fears no obstacle in its path and is convinced of. the justice of. its cause.
We can march forward boldly and confidently to the final victory of communism, because our leader is Stalin, the great continuer of Lenin's cause!
(Stormy applause, all rise. Cries of "Hurrah for our great Stalin!" "Long live Comrade Stalin!" Loud cheers and prolonged applause.)
[267] ~ [268]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
K. VOROSHILOV
Comrades, the report of Comrade Stalin is a highly valuable contribution to the treasure store of Marxist-Leninist theory. It is also a splendid guide for our Party, for our state and for the people in the struggle for the further building of socialism, the building of a communist society. Comrade Stalin's brilliant Marxist-Leninist analysis of modern capitalist society and of its relations with the country of victorious socialism has disclosed all the ulcers, the putrefaction and the agony of modern capitalism and has drawn a clear picture of the mighty progress of the socialist Soviet Union.
The world bourgeoisie is seeking to escape from its mesh of unsolvable contradictions by a bestial fascism, allowing it complete freedom of action. It is egging it on to military adventures and inciting it to fight the Soviet Union. This international policy, if we may call it so, of the ruling imperialist bourgeoisie has not only surrendered whole states to the power of fascism, but has aided and abetted it in launching a second imperialist war, of which half a billion people and a number of peaceable countries are already victims.
Comrade Stalin said in his report that"... any war, however small, started by the aggressors in any remote corner of the world constitutes a danger to the peaceable countries. All the more serious then is the danjger arising from the new imperialist war, which has already drawn into its orbit over five hundred million people in Asia, Africa and Europe.''
The country of victorious socialism is the most peaceable country in the world. But it is surrounded by hostile imperialist countries and 269 it is a thorn in the flesh to moribund capitalism, and it is therefore more in danger of military attack than any other country.
The peaceable countries, which include some of our near neighbours, are doing very little to strengthen the cause of peace and to prepare to resist the aggressors. We must therefore, as always, rely only on .ourselves.
The blessings of peace which the peoples of the Soviet Union have been enjoying for over fifteen years are due to the tremendous work of our Party, the Government and the whole people. The peace of the state is the work of our own hands.
The mighty development of our socialist economic system as a result of the splendid fulfilment of the two Stalinist Five-Year Plans, and the unparalleled development of socialist culture in our country, have enabled the Party Central Committee and the Government, under the direct guidance of our Stalin, to steadily strengthen and perfect our armed forces---the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army and Red Navy---which are a formidable power protecting the frontiers of our country and guaranteeing it against enemy invasion.
I want to tell ,the Eighteenth Party Congress in some detail, within the limits of what is permissible, of course, about the Red Army as it stands today.
But before passing to this, I want to dwell for a moment on thp steady growth of armaments of the imperialist states, especially the fascist states. I know that this is widely known, that it has already set everybody's teeth on edge, nevertheless, something must be said on the subject.
On March 5 Pravda reprinted an article from a German fascist military magazine, Die Deutsche Wehr, dealing with the armies of the principal countries in peace time and their power of expansion for war purposes, and also quoting certain figures showing their equipment in artillery and aircraft.
This article prudently refrains from saying anything about the armed forces of Germany. It does not mention that the peace strength of the army of fascist Germany is 1,150,000 men, that the fascist militarized organizations number about 2,000,000 men, and that in war time Germany will expand her army five and a half or six times.
They say nothing about themselves, but what they say about others is worth noting.
The peace strength of armies and their estimated war strength are as follows:---
270 Country
Peace
strength
Estimated
war
strength
Coefficient
of expansion
U.S.A ...............
384,000
2,500,000
6.5
Great Britain . ...
529,200
2,000,000
3 6
France . . . ....
760,000
6,100,000
6 7
Italy . . .........
400,000
2,000,000
5 0
328 000
1 500,000
4 6
Turkey . .
203 000
1,300,000
6 4
Rumania . . .
217,000
1,600,000
7 4
Poland . . ....
302,000
3.600,000
11 9
Latvia . . . .........
25,500
150,000
5.9
Esthonia ..............
11,000
100,000
9.0
Finland ..............
28.000
310.000
11.1
The figures given for the Italian and Japanese armies stand in need of very serious amendment; they are too low.
The Japanese army, for example, already has over one and a half million men under arms, and it is continuing to grow. As for Italy, the fascist leaders of that country promise to expand their army to nine or ten million men.
As regards the other armies enumerated---with the exception of the Red Army, the figures for which the fascist Deutsche Wehr muddles in a most unholy fashion---without placing complete confidence in these figures, it may nevertheless be said that they are not very far from the truth and, at any rate, are good enough to allow us to draw certain conclusions.
And the conclusions are obvious.
The first thing that strikes the eye is the high coefficient of mobilization expansion of armies in war time. If we exclude Great Britain, which will expand her army only four times, all the other armies will in case of war be increased five, six, seven and nine times, and the Polish and Finnish armies even twelve times or thereabouts.
This testifies to the disastrously tense situation which will prevail in all these countries the moment they go to war.
Yet the experience of all wars has shown that no army on active service can keep its formations and numbers within the original limits, and in a very short space of time is obliged to swell and expand.
This is particularly true in prolonged wars. And modern wars, as the second imperialist war eloquently shows, will be prolonged, protracted, ruinous.
This tenseness is also borne out by the military budgets of the principal capitalist countries, and especially of the fascist countries.
271 Growth of Military Budgets
Country
Percentage of i
to tota
•nilitary budget
budget
1934-35
1937-38
Germany ...........
21 0
67 0
43 4
70 0
Italy .
20 0
52 0
Poland
32 9
33 6
Great Britain ...........
15 5
32.2
U.S. A ...............
14 2
17 7
France ...... . .......
24.4
37 7
These figures only relate to the officially published military budgets. But it requires no great insight to guess that the fascist states directly or indirectly engaged in aggressive war have other sources to cover the military expenditures about which the public knows nothing.
The furious race in air armaments in the capitalist countries has already been going on for several years and it is undoubtedly one of the most characteristic and decisive factors rendering a universal armed collision inevitable.
What was the state of the air forces of the principal world powers at the end of the first imperialist war and what is it today?
Leaving aside the question of types of aircraft, and without going into a detailed analysis of their quality, but taking only the aggregate figures published from time to time in the world press, we get the following picture (see opposite page),.
Such was the state of the air forces of the principal capitalist countries in 1938; but, of eourse, it is entirely different now, in March 1939.
All the capitalist countries are continuing to develop their air forces at. an accelerated pace. Aviation---that young branch of the service---is regarded by all the imperialist armies as a panacea for all military ills. The imperialists have placed their stakes on aviation, and with its aid the bourgeois imperialist and fascist ruling cliques hope to win the next war.
I shall speak about our air force later.
Comrades, these few figures are enough to show the tremendous growth in the armaments of the imperialist, and especially the fascist, states and what huge sums are being spent for the new, the second universal imperialist slaughter.
272Comparative Talble
Showing the Size of the Air Forces of Foreign Countries, Their BombingPower and Their Fire-Power in Bullets per Minute in 1918, 1934 and 1938
Year
Number
of
airplanes
Increase
1918 = 100
Bombingpower
tons
Increase
1918=100
Bullets
per
minute
Increase
1918=100
Great Britain
1918 ......
1,758
605,400
100 1934 ...
1 072
1 651,200
273 1938 ...
2 238 '
128
] ,476
9915 600,000
925 Germany
1918 ......
2,730
984,800
1001934 . .
620 23 350 261954,000
97 1938 . . .
4,020
2,995
2,235
10,400,000
1,054
France
1918 .....
3,321
100 146 1001,439,700
100 1934 ...
1,970
2,595,000
180 1938 .....
4,000
1,680
1,150
9,160,000
Italy 1918
812 1001934 ......
931 115 489 1001,352,000
100 1938 . .
2,161
1,634
3145,248,000
388Japan 1918 ......
250 100 1934 ......
2,050
2,820,000
100 1938 ......
3,005
1,200
6,400,000
227Poland 1918 . ...
1934 634 100 23 100783,600
100 1938 ......
1,101
2,376,000
303 __PRINTERS_P_273_COMMENT__ 18---263 273In consequence of this altogether unrestricted and furious armament race, and of those entangled and profound contradictions of capitalism of which Comrade Stalin has spoken in his report, the international situation today is such that a second universal imperialist war has become inevitable.
The second imperialist war for a new redivision of the world is already in swing. The fascist aggressors, meeting with no impediment to their course, are intoxicated by their first easy successes and are looking around for new victims. It is difficult to foresee how this second imperialist wiar will develop, what other countries will be engulfed in its bloody torrent, and when.
But one thing is unquestionable---it follows from the whole analysis of the present international situation made by Comrade Stalin---namely, that we must always have an unfailingly strong and invincible Workers' and Peasants' Red Army and an equally strong and invincible Red 'Navy,
We know now more than ever that the only reliable guarantee against military attack on the Soviet state is to keep the Red Army and Navy in a state of real and constant military preparedness, and that only in this way, by still further strengthening and perfecting the military forces of the state, can we insure ourselves against the foul attempts of the fascists to enrich themselves by easy pickings at the expense of our country, attempts to destroy the territorial integrity of the Soviet state by military attack.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ The Workers' and Peasants' Red ArmyDuring the past five years the Red Army and Navy have undergone considerable, I would say in part radical, change as regards organization, armament, technical equipment and fighting efficiency.
I will deal with the major points:
1) As you know, the majority of the rifle units, and to some extent the other branches of the Red Army, were formerly built on a mixed principle, the so-called territorial and cadre systems.
In the event of mobilization, the territorial system predetermined the expansion of our rifle divisions around numerically small, and therefore weak, cadres. This meant that in the period immediately following mobilization, a large part of our rifle and certain other formations would have been poorly organized, and the fighting capacity of these troops would have been only relative.
The territorial system was tolerable as long as the armies of the 274 capitalist countries were comparatively small and would also, in the event of war, have been developed around weak cadres.
The territorial system, as the basis of our army, began to conflict with the defensive requirements of the state as soon as the principal imperialist countries started to increase their armies and to put them in a state of readiness for war even in peace time. We had no right to adhere to our old system of organization, for this would have put us in an unfavourable position in relation to our probable adversaries. A radical reform was needed to fit the army for the new conditions of mobilization, the tactical and strategical problems of our Red Army and the defensive requirements of the state. We could not, we had no right, to allow our army to be worse trained and weaker than the armies pf bourgeois countries.
Moreover, already in the period of the Stalinist First Five-Year Plan the territorial system no longer harmonized with the increasing supply of fighting machines and modern equipment to the army.
As a consequence, it was found necessary to abolish the territorial system as the structural basis of our army and to adopt the cadre system exclusively. Today our whole army is uniformly built on the cadre principle, which is so far the only correct one.
2) Parallel with the placing of the army on a cadre footing, the military .administrative bodies in the localities, whose organization was closely interlocked with the territorial system of formation, and which could not cope with the growing complexity of their tasks, were thoroughly reorganized.
Today the whole system of military commissariats has been reorganized. In place of the former regional corps and divisional mobilization areas, which were under the charge of the district military commissariats, a duty they did not cope with very well, independent military commissariats have been set up in the autonomous republics, territories, regions, autonomous regions and cities, while the number of district military commissariats has increased three and a half times. This measure has helped considerably to improve the system of registration and calling up of persons liable to military service, as well as the conditions of mobilization.
3) With the object of improving the administration and direction of military training of the arnly, two new military areas have been formed during this period---the Kalinin and Orel.
4) The administration of the forces in the Far East has been reorganized. In place of the former Far-Eastern Red Banner Front two separate army administrations have been formed. This measure __PRINTERS_P_275_COMMENT__ 18* 275 has markedly improved the conditions and military training of our troops in the Maritime and Pre-Amur Regions.
5) In conformity with the Stalin Constitution, the national units have been reorganized.
' The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army constitutes an integral army of the Soviet state and is recruited from among the citizens of the Soviet Union on a uniform and equal basis. The existence of separate small national military units, permanently tied to their territory, was, therefore, contrary to the principles of the Stalin Constitution and to the extra-territorial principles of formation of our army. The national units have been merged with the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army on general lines.
6) As you know, our frontiers are girdled in their more vulnerable parts by a zone of fortified areas. During this period measures were taken to strengthen the existing fortifications and to build a number of other fortified zones, the effect being to radically improve our whole system of frontier defence. The number of special troops in the fortified zones has considerably increased.
. 7) In view of the growth in the numerical strength and technical equipment of the army, as well as of the steadily growing requirements of the men with regard to culture and political knowledge, it was considered necessary to institute a system of commissars.
8) It should be added that last year the Party Central Committee and the Government set up a Supreme Military Council consisting of eleven persons, one of whom is our Stalin. (Loud applause.}
It is the function of the Supreme Military Council to examine and decide all major and important questions pertaining to the Red Army. Military Councils have been set up in the Military Districts.
9) And, lastly, during this period the Navy has been separated from the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army and placed under a separate People's Commissariat, as you all know.
I shall now deal with the changes that have taken place during this period in the combatant units themselves.
How has the numerical strength of the Red Army changed during this period?
Taking the strength of the Red Army at the time of the Seventeenth Party Congress as 100, now, in 1939, at the time of the Eighteenth Party Congress, it is 203 (loud applause and cheers), or an increase of 103 per cent. In other words, the size of the army has more than doubled.
This increase was not distributed evenly among all branches of 276 the service, but in accordance with their relative importance. This quite respectable increase in the size of the army led to other very important changes.
We have now ten times as many cadre rifle divisions as before, when the territorial system prevailed and the army was smaller.
The peace and war strength of the rifle divisions has undergone a marked change. Whereas formerly the war strength of a rifle division w&s 13,000 men, it is now 18,000. The increase is chiefly due to additional artillery---from what is known as in-fighting artillery to divisional artillery---to increased machine-gun equipment, and to an increase in the striking force of the companies, that is, in the number of riflemen per platoon.
Rifle divisions form part of rifle corps. A rifle corps consists of three, sometimes two, rifle divisions.
Thus a typical rifle corps of the Red Army constitutes a fairly imposing fighting unit: it has about 60,000 men and an appropriate quantity of artillery, tanks and other armament, all kinds of auxiliary services and motor transport.
In order to give you some idea of the fire-power of a modern rifle corps in some of the capitalist armies as compared with ours, I shall cite some figures compiled by our experts at my request.
I shall take the German and French corps for purposes of comparison, as their structure is most analogous to that of our rifle corps.
The aggregate artillery salvo of a French rifle corps (consisting of three divisions) is 6,373 kilograms; that of a German rifle corps of the same composition---6,078 kilograms. The aggregate artillery salvo of a Red Army rifle corps is 7,136 kilograms. (Applause.)
Consequently, the artillery salvo of our rifle corps is heavier than that of the German or French corps.
Further, the weight of shells that can, be fired per minute by the rifle corps mentioned is: French---51,462 kilograms, and German--- 48,769 kilograms. Our rifle corps can deliver 66,605 kilograms of metal per minute. (Applause.)
In addition to artillery, a corps is equipped with rifles, machineguns, mortars, grenade-guns and the like, which increases the total weight of metal that can be hurled by a corps per minute.
If we add together the weight of shells, mines, rifle grenades and bullets that can be delivered per minute, we get the following figures:
277 French corps .......... 60,981 kilograms
German corps.......... 69,509 "
Our corps ............ 78,932
(Applause.)
These figures show that our rifle corps, and consequently, the whole Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, is not lagging behind, and if anything surpasses, the armies of the. capitalist, fascist countries in fire-power. (Applause.)
I deliberately refrain from quoting figures---although I have them---regarding the Japanese, Polish and other armies, because the organization and armament of these armies, of their divisions and corps, are beneath all comparison with those of the armies of Germany and France.
The Party Central Committee, the Government, Comrade Stalin, the Whole Party and the entire nation demand that we shall not lag behind our neighbours in respect to armament and the defensive power of our state; and we are not lagging, as you see---we have no right to. (Applause.)
The Red cavalry, like other branches of the service, has also grown in strength. The increase in cavalry is 52 per cent. The increase in technical equipment of the cavalry is as follows:
Light machine guns.......... 30 per cent
Heavy machine guns......... 21 "
Anti-aircraft guns and equipment ... 31 "
Artillery............... 43 "
In addition, the cavalry have been equipped with special antiaircraft artillery, which securely protects it from air attack; the tank regiments of the cavalry divisions have been enlarged by 30 per cent and they have been furnished with special armoured car units.
These are the main, things---not to mention the numerous minor things---that have been done to increase the fighting power and striking force of our Red cavalry.
The armoured car and tank troops have grown during this period as follows: their total man-power has increased by 152V2 per cent. The tank units and formations have been thoroughly reorganized to adapt them to tactical requirements. The number of tank units has increased by 180 per cent and the number of tanks by 191 per cent. The number of armoured cars has increased seven and a half times.
278Parallel with this the equipment of the tank troops has been modernized. New types of tanks have been introduced and the old ones have been perfected as regards defensive armour and special equipment.
There has been a marked change in the armament of the tank troops, especially in respect to artillery.
In order to give you some idea of the fire-power of the tank troops today as compared with what it was five years ago, I shall mention the following figures.
If the aggregate salvo of all types of firing weapons of tanks and armoured cars in 1934 be taken as a 100, in 1939 it is 393. In other words, the fire-power of our tank troops is nearly four times as great as in 1934.
Further, if the aggregate fire-power per minute of our tanks in 1934 be taken as a 100, in 1939 it is 334, or nearly three and a half times as much.
Artillery. Very serious attention has been paid to the artillery equipment of our troops, and the results are no mean ones.
Light artillery, not counting anti-tank guns and in-fighting artillery, has increased during this period by 34 per cent.
Medium artillery has increased by 26 per cent.
Heavy artillery has increased by 85 per cent.
Anti-aircraft guns have increased by 169 per cent.
Anti-tank and tank artillery, which was inadequately developed, has increased at an even faster pace than other types of artillery. I may say briefly that as regards anti-tank and tank artillery the Red Army is fully equipped, and moreover with first-class weapons.
We formerly did not have, or, to be exact, had very little, infighting artillery. Now we are manufacturing this highly important species of artillery (mortars and bomb-throwers) and are supplying it in the needed quantity and of good quality.
Parallel with the growth in the quantity of artillery, there has been an improvement in the quality both of the new systems introduced and of the old, which have been thoroughly modernized.
In addition, the proportion between guns and howitzers in the artillery units has radically changed. I need only mention that howitzers have increased by 80 per cent, which means that our artillery has become more deadly and effective.
The range of all types of artillery has increased. The increase 279 in the range of heavy artillery, for example, varies from 50 to 75 per cent, depending on the type.
There has also been an increase in the firing speed of all types of artillery, especially of tank and anti-tank guns, whose firing speed has more than doubled.
Shells are now of greater weight and effectiveness.
The chemical service troops of the Red Army, whose function it is to defend the army from chemical attack and to retaliate to a chemical blow of the enemy by a similar chemical blow, has also undergone a change of organization and has doubled in numerical strength.
Today the methods of chemical defence, both as to quality and quantity, are entirely different from what they were five years ago.
First of all, there has been an improvement in the means of protecting the exposed parts of the skin and the respiratory organs of our men; we are manufacturing in sufficient quantities means for protecting the men from chemical attack from the air: we also have means of protecting horses and of preserving materials from damage by chemicals.
- There has been an improvement in the quality and a considerable increase in the quantity of mechanical and technical means of decontaminating affected localities. A great deal has been done in devising special machines for this purpose.
Just a few words regarding the signal corps, that very important branch of the service on which the whole wtork of administering and directing an army in peace time, and especially in war time, depends.
The strength of the signal corps has increased by 37 per cent, chiefly as a result of the modern equipment furnished to the troops.
Wireless apparatus with a larger radius of action and with automatic recording equipment has been introduced.
Fast-action telegraph apparatus has increased by 200 per cent. Long-distance telephone apparatus has been introduced.
The mobility of the signal corps has been increased.
The signal corps has been almost completely motorized.
All this, and much else, necessitated an increase in the numerical strength and an improvement in the quality of this branch of the service.
An important question is the active defence of our country from the air. Considerable attention was devoted to the question during this period, but it must be confessed that we have not yet done all 280 we should. However, even as it is, there is already a marked improvement in the air defence of the major centres of our country.
I need Only mention the numerical increase in anti-aircraft guns to show how much has been done in this field. Anti-aircraft guns have increased by 288.3 per cent.
The quality of the anti-aircraft guns has also improved; for example, the ceiling of fire has increased by 60 per cent. (Applause.)
As you know, the air defence of our important state centres and cities is based on the coordinated action of anti-aircraft guns and pursuit planes. Parallel with an improvement in their coordination, there has been an increase in the number of pursuit planes, by 142.3 per cent.
I shall not dwell on what is known as passive (what a word!) air defence---it would be better and truer to call it local, or civil, air defence^^1^^---although the question is one that deserves to be spoken about at length. I would only say that the position in this respect is not so good, and not owing so much to the fault of us (the military men), as to that of the officials in the localities. This matter must be tackled more energetically and without delay.
I shall make no mention of air defence in the army, which is developing normally and is commensurate with the growth of the army.
In order not to fatigue you, I shall leave out many matters relating to the auxiliary services, such as, railway, engineer, searchlight, motor transport and so on, which, like the army as a whole, have completely changed their aspect during this period, both as to quantity and, especially, as to quality.
Compared with 1934, the personnel of the air force has increased by 138 per cent, that is, it is nearly two and a half times as large. (Applause.)
The total number of planes has increased by 130 per cent, or has considerably more than doubled.
If, however, the strength of the air force as compared with 1934 is expressed in engine power, we find that it has increased by 7,900,000 horse power, or an increase of 213 per cent compared with five years ago. (Applause.)
This quantitative growth of the air force has been accompanied by a change in its quality.
Here are a few figures that bear this out:
281 I
Increase
> e r c e n
t
Speed
Ceiling
Range
Pursuit planes . . .
56 5
• 21 5
88 0
83 0
50 0
Bombers (long-range) . . ...... . ; . .
70.0
77 0
61.0
Scout and battle planes . . ......
67 0
23 0
45 0
During this period there has been a change in the relative proportion of the various types of military aircraft, which is a factor of great importance.
The proportion of heavy bombers has risen from 10.6 per cent to 20.6 per cent, that is, has doubled.
' The proportion of light bombers, battle planes and scout planes has dropped from 50.2 per cent to 26 per cent, or by half.
The proportion of pursuit planes has increased from 12.3 per cent to 30 per cent, that is, two and a half timies.
Thus the proportion of heavy bombers and pursuit planes has more than doubled.
This means that our air force has become more powerful and its striking effect has correspondingly increased.
Whereas in 1934 our air force could carry a total load of 2,000 tons of bombs in one flight, it can now carry 208 per cent more; that is, the aggregate bomb volley has trebled. This mass of destructive metal, capable of being translated huge distances, may serve as quite an effective Soviet strait-jacket for frenzied aggressors, if in an insane fit they should attempt to set foot on Soviet soil. (Loud applause.)
Parallel with this, there has been an incre'ase in the aggregate machine gun fire-power of our air force. If the total number of shots that could be fired per minute by our aircraft machine guns in 1934 be taken as a 100, in 1939 the figure is 400.
I can understand the natural wish of comrades to know what sort of aircraft we have, at least to know what is their speed, ceiling and range, expressed not in percentages, but in figures comprehensible to the lay mind. In deference to this natural wish, let me mention that you may now meet in our military aerodromes not only pursuit planes but even bombers with a speed far exceeding 282 500 kilometres per hour (loud applause, and cheers. Shouts of "Long live Comrade Stalin!" "Long live Comrade Voroshilov!" "Long live the Red Air Force!" The delegates, rise and heartily cheer Comrade Stalin), and with a ceiling of 14,000-15,000 metres. (Applause.) As for the range of our aircraft, nothing could be said more eloquently than was said by the deeds of the late Valery Chkalov, Hero of the Soviet Union, of Heroes of the Soviet Union Gromiov, Baidukov, Yumashev, Belyakov, Danilin, Kokkinaki and the late Bryandinsky, and of our splendid airwomen, Heroes of the Soviet Union Grizodubova, Ossipenko and Raskova. (Applause.)
And you all know, of course, that these and many, many other heroes, our Stalin falcons, will tell still more of the qualities of our aircraft to our people and to the whole world. (Prolonged applause.)
Comrades, I have said nothing about our valiant Workers' and Peasants' Navy, not only because it now constitutes a separate force directed by a separate People's Commissariat, but because, as you know from Comrade Molotov's speech in the Supreme Soviet and from other sources, the Party and the Government have decided to build, and are already successfully building, a powerful navy, both for sea and ocean service, and also because other comrades will speak about the navy.
To conclude this section of my speech, I will cite some figures illustrating the extent to which our army is motorized.
Since 1934 the motorization of our army as a whole has increased by 260 per cent. The position is as follows: whereas in 1934 we had an average of 7.74 horse power per Red Armyman, in 1939 we have an average of 13 horse power, or an increase of 67 per cent. (Prolonged applause.) This in spite of the fact that the size of the army itself has more than doubled.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ PersonnelComrades, 1 have told you about the changes that have taken place during the past five years in the organization, armament and technical equipment of our army. Our army has completely changed as regards quantity, and especially as regards quality.
I have said nothing about the personnel, about our men, commanders, commissars, political workers, engineers, sappers, surgeons, quartermasters, in a word, about the human element of our army which in the long run decides everything and actually determines the 283 fighting strength and military power of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army.
Without men, technique is dead. Technique in the hands of men who understand it and have mastered it is a great force.
Cadres decide everything. That is beyond question. That is why the Party Central Committee and the Government have devoted, and are devoting, so much attention to increasing the number of our own, genuinely Soviet military cadres, people with a high sense of military duty and supremely devoted to their country and to the great cause of Lenin and Stalin. Much attention is being devoted to educating and perfecting our cadres both in political and in specialized military knowledge. We have all the cadres we need and of the right quality. They are steadily developing in all respects in step with the development of our great country and army. It is just these people, just these cadres that mjake our Red Army a firstclass army, invincible in the power of its organization, armament and military efficiency, and unique in its spirit and political and moral strength.
When the Red Army was being purged of the scoundrels who had betrayed their state and their colours, the fascists and other imperialist aggressors raised a frenzied outcry claiming that our military cadres had been weakened and that as a result the fighting efficiency of the Red Army had suffered, and so on in a similar strain.
Comrade Stalin has made perfectly clear the true reasons for all this howling of our enemies. We are not playing the game, don't you see, in rooting out the secret agents and spies from the ranks of our army, where this scum had been sent by foreign espionage services. It would have been nicer for the fascist rulers and their servitors if vile traitors like the Tukhachevskys, Yegorovs and Orlovs and similar corrupt scoundrels were allowed to continue operating in our midst, betraying our army and country. It would have been far more convenient, of course, for the instigators of world wars to carry on their sinister work having their own reliable agents in foreign armies. After all, it is easier for a burglar to break into a house if he has an accomplice inside to let him in.
No attention. need have been paid to these insinuations of the fascist hacks about the alleged weakness of the Red Army iand the rest if the fascist aggressors had not drawn very real conclusions from them.
I am referring to the gentry who, swallowing the reports of their 284 friends about the weakness of the Red Army, and, which is the chief thing, having lost their own agents whom! they had sent into our army, were incautious enough to hasten to "take advantage of a favourable opportunity," as it seemed to them, and to march on Lake Hassan with the object of squeezing through the Soviet gate, pocketing the property of others and thus improving their own shaky affairs.
The outcome of this burglarious scheme is well known.
The valiant First Detached Red Banner 'Army branded its reply with the weapons of its men, commanders and political workers on the backs of these light-fingered gentry, a reply which told the truth about the fighting efficiency of the Soviet army, and of the morale of its commanding and political personnel.
Let us hope that this object lesson will be remembered by those who are casting covetous eyes on the Soviet country, who delude themselves that the Red Army has been weakened, and who are inclined to believe the fairy tale that the Soviet soil is an easy prey for burglarious invasions.
But if the object lesson of Lake Hassan was not enough, our Red Army is prepared at any minute to repeat it on a larger and more convincing scale for the benefit of anybody who asks for it. (Applause.)
In view of the fact that the Red Army has more than doubled in size, and in view also of its increased and more complex military and auxiliary equipment, there has been a corresponding growth in the number, and hence a decrease in the average age, of its commanding, political and other leading personnel.
The numerical growth of our cadres during the past five years is shown by the following figures:
The commanding and other higher personnel of our infantry, including their artillery units, has increased 118 per cent, cavalry 66 per cent, armoured car and tank troops 154 per cent, artillery 124.5 per cent,
Our aviation personnel in general, including engineers, artificers and auxiliaries, has increased by 148 per cent, the number of airmen alone by 184 per cent, and aviation engineers by 801 per cent.
The Red Army as a whole represents---in peace time, of course--- a huge school where hundreds of thousands of good Soviet citizens are not only learning their job, their particular speciality, the art of defeating the enemy, but are also---from the lowest rank to the 285 highest---studying politics, perfecting their knowledge and mastering the theory of Marxism-Leninism.
How effectively is this gigantic adult school functioning? We may say one thing, and that is that it is working hard and persistently. And the achievements are no mean ones. But it must work even harder and more energetically and its achievements must be multiplied, they are still not enough.
The armies of all bourgeois countries forbid, absolutely forbid, at least the small fry, to take any part in politics. Soldiers are punished for taking part in politics in those countries. Our army is strong because of its political consciousness and political activity. Hence the demand made of the commanding and other personnel of the Red Army: if you want to be useful in your post and of benefit to your subordinates, if you want to serve your people and the cause of Lenin and Stalin conscientiously, if you want to be a real Bolshevik Leninist, then study, study hard, steadily perfecting your knowledge; you must know your speciality like the palm of your hand, otherwise you will be unable to cope with the job entrusted to you and will disgrace yourself in the eyes of your subordinates. And the chief thing is that you must, absolutely must be politically educated, and active like a Bolshevik should be; you must not only be a good expert at your job----good you must be, even if you cannot be excellent---but an equally good citizen of the socialist state, versed in political knowledge and a useful builder of the socialist state. Unfortunately, these requirements are not always punctiliously fulfilled by all the personnel of the Red Army; nevertheless, a great deal is being done, and done successfully, in the way of training the personnel of the Red Army in Marxism-Leninism.
We have a system of schools for the training of commanders and various kinds of experts for the Red Army, that is, for the replenishment of our Red officer corps. This system is not working at all badly.
We have sixty-three schools for land troops in which tens of thousands of splendid Soviet young men are studying and which annually turn over to the army thousands of well-trained and politically educated young officers---lieutenants---devoted to the Party of Lenin and Stalin.
Our aviation personnel is reinforced from the graduates of thirtytwo flying schools and aeronautical engineering schools. The Party and the Young- Communist League supply over twenty thousand of their finest members to these schools, where they study to be 286 future Red pilots, navigators and aeronautical experts. The students of these aviation schools, as of the other military schools, in addition to their special curricula, take a course in social and political subjects.
The total number on the rolls of the various schools has during the past five years increased as follows: schools for land troops--- 117.8 per cent; military political schools alone---273.3 per cent; Air Force schools---187 per cent.
The officer schools supply the Red Army with well-trained commanders. This is specially true of the past few years, when nearly all the students on entering these schools already had a complete---in some cases incomplete---secondary education.
But in addition to these, the army needs, and in large numbers at that, commanders and various highly skilled experts with a university education.
For this purpose the Red Army has fourteen military academies and six military faculties in civil universities which together accommodate wiell over twenty thousand commanders, political workers, engineers, surgeons and others.
In this way the army is annually supplied with the required number of highly-trained, and in the majority of cases really educated, commanders, commissars, engineers of various specialities, surgeons, commissaries, and so on.
In addition, the military academies conduct evening courses and correspondence courses in their respective programs. Some fifteen thousand commanders and other leading personnel of the army are enrolled in these courses.
I have said nothing about our regimental schools and courses which provide a six months' or twelve months' course of study for petty commanders and in which the Red Army trains several hundred thousand persons annually.
These schools fill a big and important place in the life of the army. They provide it with the petty commanders, who form the backbone of the military organization, the direct and immediate superiors of the men, and who share all the joys and labours of military life with the rank and file both in peace time and in time of war. The petty commanders gave a splendid account of themselves at Lake Hassan, they held high the fighting colours of our Red Army, and the insolent enemy is not likely to forget them. (Loud applause. The delegates rise and cheer. Shouts of "Long live the Red Army!")
287A word regarding the reserve cadres. However large the personnel of the army in peace time, it cannot meet the full requirements of the army in time of war. This necessitates a large amount of work in assembling a cadre reserve of commianding, political and other leading personnel, and maintaining them at the proper level of training.
The problem of satisfying their requirements in officers in time of war is the most difficult problem: the armies of capitalist countries have to face. We experience no such difficulty. On the whole and in the main, we have already solved the problems of satisfying the requirements of the army in commanding and other leading personnel and of replenishing them in time of war.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Material and Cultural Conditions in the Red ArmyThe material conditions of our men are of a very high level. The question of provisioning, equipping, quartering and otherwise satisfying the requirements of the Red Armymen has been and always will be one of the utmost importance, and it is receiving the unflagging attention of the commanders, commissars and political personnel.
The material condition of the officer staff as a whole has undergone a marked change in the past five years.
The average pay of commanders, commissars, political workers and other leading personnel has increased by 286 per cent.
Pay Increases of the Principal Eanks
1934
rubles
1939
rubles
Increase
per cent
Platoon commander ............
Company commander
286 750 263Battalion commander .........
335 850 254Regimental commander ...........
4001,200
300Divisional commander . . .
4751 600
337Corps commander ............
5502,000
364 288Cultural services in the Red Army have developed tremendously, which of course has had a most beneficial effect on the cultural growth of the men and of the whole army.
For example, .we had 15,091 Lenin corners in 1934; in 1939 w,e have 26,435.
We had 1,33.6 clubs in 1934; now we have 1,900.
Whereas in 1934 we had 142 Red Army Centres, we now have 267.
There has been a big increase in wireless receiving sets, cinemas, traveling cinemas and so on. It need only be mentioned that there are now 350,000 wireless receiving points in the Red Army.
The libraries of the Red Army now have a -total of twenty-five million volumes.
The personnel of the Red Army subscribe for 1,725,000 copies of daily newspapers, and regularly take in 471,500 copies of magazines.
The expenditures on cultural and educational work now amount to 230,000,000 rubles, as compared with 72,000,000 rubles in 1934.
Much useful work in catering to the cultural needs of the Red Army is performed by the Union of Art Workers. Whole theatres, concert and dramatic troupes, the finest musicians, actors, singers and others willingly display their skill and talent to the army. Scientists, technologists, engineers and other experts also perform valuable service to the Red Army by lecturing and catering to the needs of our men, commanders and other leading personnel, for which the Red Army rewards its friends with unfailing gratitude and esteem.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ The Air and Chemical Defence Society and OtherI think it necessary to say a few words about the Air and Chemical Defence Society and other public organizations.
The A.C.D.S. is a mass voluntary organization and carries on a great and useful work. It is the function of this organization to train workers, intellectuals, students and.collective farmers for the defence of the state. In addition, the A.C.D.S. helps the Red Army in the preliminary ``rough'' work of training forces in various military branches.
While I entertain the highest respect for the personnel of the A.C.D.S., especially for those active volunteers who like true patriots __PRINTERS_P_289_COMMENT__ 19-263 289 of the Soviet state sincerely devote much effort to the service of the country's defence, I must say that the A.C.D.S. could show much better results, and that we are not doing all we should to make the best and fullest use of this splendid organization. We must in the nearest future do our utmost to make the organizations of the A.C.D.S. cover all factories, institutions, educational establishments and collective farms. Its work must really acquire a mass, public character, and every one of its members must be got to realize the usefulness and necessity of its work.
We have other defence organizations, like the Red Cross Society and the Red Crescent Society. Unfortunately, they are not of a sufficiently popular character. Yet there was a time when they functioned quite well, and they could do important and good work if the Party organizations in the localities gave them some of their attention, if only from time to time.
It should be remembered that the fascist states, and not only the fascist states, have at present a large number of special defence organizations which, being built on military lines, represent an important and effective supplement to their regular armies.
We cannot, we have no right, to lag in this matter of organizing our population for the defence of our cities, factories, mills and collective farms, and the lives and property of our people from possible enemy attack.
Comrades, I shall not dwell on such an important state organization as the Civil Air Fleet, which, in the event of war, will be entirely adapted to the needs of defence. It is headed by Comrade Molokov, Hero of the Soviet Union, who maintains constant and close contact with the Red Army and who is doing his best to strengthen and develop the Civil Air Fleet and to make it fit at the required moment to assist the military Air Force in the defence of the country.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Political Education of the Red ArmyThe Red Army is a unique army the like of which is unknown in history. It was created by the first people to defeat its enemies in the struggle for so,cial emancipation.
The specific features of the Red Army are described in the words of Comrade Stalin:
``The first and principal feature of our Red Army is that it is the army of the emancipated workers and peasants, the army of 290 the October Revolution, the army of the dictatorship of the proletariat. ...
``The second feature of our Red Army is that it is an army based on the fraternity of the nations of our country, an army that emancipated the oppressed nations of our country, an-army that is defending the liberty and independence of the nations of our country. ...
``And, lastly, a third feature of the Red Army: it is the spirit of internationalism, the international sentiments which imbue our whole Red Army.''
This definition of the specific features of our Red Army giVen by Stalin is the guiding principle of all the Party's educational and political work in the Red Army. It is on these three precepts that the political life and morale of men and commanders rest.
The Red Army, like the entire Soviet people, lives and is trained in the teachings of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. The army has its own political apparatus. Side by side with the strong Party and Young Communist League organizations, it is the function of the political apparatus of the Red Army to work for the steady and constant political development of the men, commanders and the whole personnel of the army. The Party has entrusted the military commissars, political guides and other political workers with the highly responsible task of serving the army, and especially the nonParty men, commanders and other personnel, in the political field.
The place of the political commissars of the Red Army in this work is a highly important one. It is their duty to see that the staffs of the political organs themselves are always carefully selected, that the political workers are worthy of their job, that the MarxistLeninist, the political knowledge and general cultural outlook of the political workers are always on a proper level. In a word, it is the first duty of the military commissar to organize the political organs, the political workers, and through them---and with their cooperation and on their responsibility---the entire political work.
But this is only part, although, it is true, a most important part, of the work of the military commissar. The military commissar is a very responsible figure in the army. During the Civil war he played a highly important and responsible part. ."Without the military commissar we would not have had the Red Army," Lenin said. And today, too, when the army has been equipped with highly effective military and auxiliary equipment of the most diverse, kinds, when __PRINTERS_P_291_COMMENT__ 19* 291 the army has become a highly complex organism, and when the commander has to devote a large share of his time to military and special training, the military commissar plays an important and responsible part. The commander and the military commissar constitute a single unit in the matter of directing the military and political training and education of their unit. Both are responsible for the military, political, moral, administrative, .living and other conditions of their unit. Both the commander and the military commissar will lead their unit, their formation, into action. It is therefore necessary, in addition to all that has already been mentioned, to work persistently to train every officer and commissar of the Reel Army in strength of will and the ability to command.
A special responsibility for this work lies on the military commissar.
The political apparatus of the army, that is, the military commissars, political guides and political workers of all kinds, has been considerably enlarged in the interval between the Seventeenth and the Eighteenth Congresses. On January 1, 1934, we had fifteen thousand political workers; today the army has thirty-four thousand, an increase of 126 per cent.
As a result of the purge of the Red Army of traitors, spies and treasonable elements, and the purge of the political apparatus itself of such putrid and treacherous scum, the role and importance of the political apparatus, and of the military commissar in the first place, has been considerably enhanced. And the sense of responsibility of the whole political personnel for their work has grown.
The political personnel of the Red Army have been largely renewed in the past few years. Thousands of fine young men, members of our Party, honest, devoted and capable workers, have been advanced from the lower ranks to various responsible posts.
These are some of the finest people in the Party organization of the army; these are active people who are supremely devoted to the cause of Lenin and Stalin, and who in the past two or three years hava shown themselves to be real Party men, fighters for the purity of the ranks of the Party and for the might of the Red Army. It is they who, together with the whole Party organization and with the support of all honest non-Party men and commanders, have with an iron broom swept the army clean of traitors and scoundrels, so that it is now stronger and politically more closely welded than ever before. These political workers, in conjunction with all the active Party and Y.C.L. members in the army, are carrying on important 292 educational work, raising the political level of our army with the object of preventing the appearance within it not only of treacherous and treasonable elements, but of all sceptics, malcontents and other dross who in the long run grow into, and are bound to grow into, real traitors and agents of our class enemies.
The political organs of the army have now received so splendid an aid to their work as the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)---Short Course. This remarkable work has not only become a handbook for political workers and commanders, but also a constant and indispensable aid in the political education of our Red Armymen.
Political educational work embraces all the men and commanders and the whole personnel of the Red Army. The many thousands of members of the Young Communist League in the army act as splendid assistants of the political organs and as a medium in the carrying out of all their measures to serve the needs of the non-Party men and commanders.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Military Training of the Workers' and Peasants' Red ArmyEvery branch of the army, from the infantry to the engineers, has its full complement of commanding and political personnel, men who know their job to perfection.
There was a considerable improvement in 1937-38 in the efficiency and training of the troops in every combatant, technical and tactical branch.
The tactical training and marksmanship of the rifle units, in spite of the increased complexity of this branch of the service in every respect, is on a proper level. However, the infantry commanders, commissars and political workers must work harder and more persistently to achieve even better results with regard to marksmanship.
The Red Army has always been distinguished for its snipers and for its excellent riflemen and .machine-gunners, and it wili continue to spread and perfect this art, not resting content with what has already been achieved. We must work persistently to give our infantry an even more thorough training in tactics and marksmanship, and to increase the efficiency of staffs, regiments, divisions and army corps. We must work more persistently in training the rifle regiments in coordinated action with other branches of the army.
The training of the Red cavalry has always been on a very high level and it may now serve as a model of organization arid military 293 efficiency. Our cavalry skilfully combine their own specialized cavalry training with their mechanical means of warfare. Our modern Red cavalry will in time of war prove a high model of -military art in skilful and relentless battle with the enemy.
The efficiency of the artillery, of which we have large quantities in every branch of the army, is on a high level. Yet modern artillery differs very considerably even from the artillery of the recent past, and its handling has therefore become more complicated. So has coordination between artillery and other branches. The Soviet artillerymen, like the Soviet cavalry, have always loved their job, known it thoroughly and achieved good results in combatant and tactical training. Today our artillery of all types, and its men, commanders and commissars are highly trained and are capable of coping with any military task that may be assigned to them.
Our gallant tank operators know their job well. There are whole tank units and formations whose efficiency is estimated very highly. On the whole, all our tank units are well organized and quite efficient as regards firing and tactics. This branch of the service will undoubtedly cope with any military task entrusted to it, for the men, commanders, commissars and political personnel are skilled in their jobs and know it "to a T." (Laughter.)
The special troops---signals, engineers, chemical, railway and so on---are quite efficient. These branches are not very numerous and have splendidly trained cadres, and as a rule are highly efficient in their special and tactical training.
Lastly, a few words about the military efficiency of the Air Force. Today our air force represents a highly complex arm. Its military efficiency entails considerable knowledge, skill and energy on the part of the commanders, commissars, political workers, engineers, technicians, and the entire personnel.
Furthermore, the military efficiency of the air force always depends to a certain extent on meteorological conditions. Nevertheless thanks to its splendid pilots and other personnel, our Red Air Force shows a high level of efficiency both in its own special branch and in tactics; This has been proved more than once in practice. {Loud applause.)
The general training of the Red Army as a whole constitutes the main task of the command, and it is by no means on a low level.
That our Red Army is not badly trained is borne out even by the testimony of our enemies, who, as I have already said, were incautious enough to try to grab a piece of Soviet territory.
294Here are some of- the entries found in the diaries of fallen Japanese officers:
1. Major Hirabari, commander of a battalion of the 75th Infantry Regiment, made the following entry in his diary:
``We suffered heavily from the Soviet tanks. They took advantage of the terrain, came up quite close, and opened fire on us. Their aim was good and their fire terrible. Taking advantage of natural cover, the Soviet tanks wo.uld often only expose their gun towers for firing piirposes. Our own shooting was not effective enough. When the tanks came under our artillery fire their operators would often leap from their machines and take cover in folds in the ground until our fire was diverted.
``The crews would often dismount the machine guns from the tanks and open telling fire on our soldiers, and then return to their tanks.''
2. Major Nakana, commander of the 1st Battalion of the 75th Infantry Division, wrote in his diary as follows: "*
``Here we are already two days in the trenches while the Soviet ar'my has been active. It passes to the offensive, and then rapidly resumes the defensive. It is dangerous to show one's nose. We used to be told that it was a weak army, but now that we have met it m action I see that this was a mistake. The Red troops attacked furiously again and again.
``Yesterday there were 137 men in No. 3 Company; today there are only fifty left, and it has already been reduced to a platoon.
``At dawn on July 31 our No. 1 Company attacked Hsa-tsao-feng Hill. For five hours fourteen of the enemy's men stubbornly held back the advance of our company and inflicted heavy losses on it, and it was only after a hand-to-hand bayonet fight that they were driven out.''
3. Lieutenant Kofuendo of No 11 Company, 75th Infantry Regiment of the Japanese army wrote in his diary:
``The Reds make good use of all forms of small arms---rifles, light machine guns and heavy machine guns. We suffered heavy losses from their telling rifle fire even at a distance of 900 or 1000 metres. The Soviet snipers are very clever at camouflage, making skilful use of natural cover. Three or four soldiers will get together, at once dig themselves in and open a telling fire along our whole position with very destructive effects. We have many killed and wounded.''
Here, comrades, we have evidence which, if prejudiced, is prejudiced in the other direction, in the direction of minimizing the 295 fighting efficiency of our troops. It shows that our commanders and political personnel are earning their Soviet bread; they are doing "their bit," as you see, and not unsuccessfully. (Applause.)
The Red Army has always been the object of special attention of the Central Committee of bur Party, of the Workers' and Peasants' Government and of Comrade Stalin personally. The two Stalinist FiveYear Plans have resulted in a tremendous growth of our industry and of our socialist economy generally, and our army has steadily grown in size and perfection commensurately.
I have dwelt in fairly great detail on the modern armament and technical equipment of our army. I have spoken of the changes that have taken place in this respect during the past five years, the result of which is that our army is so well armed and equipped, and our cadres and personnel generally so highly trained, that the Soviet people has now nothing to fear from the machinations of any enemy. It may go about its great'socialist work calmly, in the full assurance that its countr^---the Soviet state=---is being protected by the might of the Red Army and the Red Navy.
I must say a few words of thanks to the workers, engineers, technicians and office personnel, and especially to the Party and Y.C.L. organizations of our socialist mills and factories, which, having purged themselves of traitors and enemies of the people, have done so much to equip the Red Army and Navy with modern fighting weapons and to strengthen the defensive power of our country. Not only has our industry produced many splendid individuals, but there are now quite a number of huge plants whose services have been noted by the Party and the Government and awarded with distinctions of the Soviet Union.
Great work, and useful work, has been done by Comrade M. M. Kaganovich, the head of the former People's Commissariat of the Defence Industry. He has been ably assisted by Comrades Vannikov and Tevosyan and by a host of other fine Party and non-Party Bolsheviks, workers in our socialist industry. I suggest, comrades, we give them a cheer. (The delegates rise and cheer lustily.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Political and Moral State of the Red ArmyThe force and significance of the political and moral factor in the military action of troops was defined by Clausewitz, the classical military writer and thinker of the nineteenth century, in his book 296 War as follows: ". . . Most phenomena . .. consist partly of physical and partly Of moral causes and effects. One might say that the physical are like the wooden hilt, while the moral are the noble metal, the keen Made itself.''
The high political and moral standing of the Red Army is just this noble ``metal'' which Clausewitz wrote of, with the only difference that in the sum total of factors which make for victory, our communist morale, the ``spirit'' of our Red Army, is. nothing like the spirit of the old, semi-feudal and bourgeois armies.
During the Civil War the Red Army, poorly clad, ill-fed and indifferently arimed, defeated and utterly destroyed the well-equipped and strongly armed forces of the interventionists and Whiteguards. This revealed the spirit and high morale of the new Red Army, a genuine revolutionary army of the people. The Civil War showed that in an army which fights for its oiwn interests, an army inspired with the great teaching of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin and led by the Communist -Party, the moral factor is immeasurably superior to that of any capitalist army, let alone the semi-feudal, bourgeois armies which Clausewitz had in mind.
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army is of the same flesh and blood as its people and shares the interests of the whole country. Under the leadership of the great Party of Lenin and Stalin, it is waging a struggle for the new, communist society, and at the first call of the ,Party,' at the orders of its Government, it will stand in defence of its country, its people and the socialist state.
The Red Army, guided by its Party and non-Party Bolsheviksits commanders and military commissars---and thanks to its powerful Party and Y. C. L. Organizations and its efficient political work, has always a good grasp of home and foreign affairs. It is always keenly responsive to all events in the home and foreign affairs of the country.
Comrades, our army has grown up with the people and has fought side by side with the people; it fought and completely defeated all its class enemies, domestic and foreign, in the Civil War. Many of the finest people of our Party, fighting in the ranks of the Red Army, laid down their lives for the cause of the people, for the cause of Lenin and Stalin.
In these past few years, when the army was being thoroughly reorganized and re-equipped and becoming an ever stronger and more mighty force of the Soviet state, the despicable traitors of the TrotskyZinoviev-Bukharin gang tried, by treason to the colours and betrayal 297 of the interests of the people and the state, to destroy our army from within, to treacherously enfeeble it and to make its defeat certain in time of war.
This 'suppurating ulcer of treachery has been lanced. The Red Army was rapidly and thoroughly purged of all this filth.
Comrades, the Red Army is a tremendous force. The men, commanders and political personnel of our army represent a monolithic collective body welded together by the Marxist-Leninist ideology. The Red Army is ready at any moment, like one man, to perform its sacred duty as defender of the state where labour is victorious, is eager and willing, as one man, to sacrifice life itself for the great cause of Lenin and Stalin. (Applause.)
More than a half of our army consists of Communists and members of the Young Communist League. But even those who belong neither to the Party nor to the Young Communist League are genuine non-Party Bolsheviks, who are heart and soul with the Red Army, with their socialist country, with the cause of Lenin and Stalin.
We know how at Lake Hassan nori-Party Bolsheviks vied with Party and Y.C.L. members in military valour and genuine heroism in battle with the enemy for our socialist country, for our Party, for Stalin. (Applause.}
Our army stands a watchful sentinel over the frontiers dividing the socialist world from the world of oppression, violence and capitalist barbarity. It is ready at any moment to launch into battle against any enemy who dares to set foot on the sacred soil of the Soviet state. (Stormy applause.)
A pledge that the enemy will be crushed and destroyed at short order is the political and moral unity of the Red Army with the entire Soviet people.
A pledge is the Marxist-Leninist ideology, the ideology of the Party of Lenin and Stalin, which inspires the army of the Soviet state. The men, commanders and political workers are always prepared to lay down their lives for this ideology.
A pledge is the fact that our Workers' and Peasants' Red Army is a first-class army, better than any other army, an army that is technically equipped and splendidly trained.
A pledge, too, are those numerous Heroes of the Soviet Union who have earned this high title by their supreme service to the people in the ranks of the army.
Comrades, our army is invincible!
298It is the offspring, the splendid creation of our Party, and it is always ready at the behest of the Party, of our Government, and of our great Stalin, the leader of peoples, to fight for its socialist country and to put into practice the sacred words of the military oath.
``I swear to defend it courageously, ably, worthily and honourably, not hesitating to sacrifice life and limb for complete victory over the enemy.''
Long live our great Communist Party of the Soviet Union!
Long live the Eighteenth Congress of our Party 1
Long live our great Stalin! (All rise. Loud and prolonged cheers. Shouts of "Long live Comrade Stalin!" "Long live Comrade Voroshilov!")
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__ALPHA_LVL1__
L. KAGANOVICH
Comrades, we have heard here the report of Comrade Stalin on the activities of the Central Committee of our Party. Every one of us feels and realizes that this is not just a report, but a program mobilizing millions of people for new and great deeds. This report stirs us and fires us with a new access of fervour, energy, eagerness to work harder---to work harder for the glory of socialism.
While in the first period of the Soviet power the whole life and activity of our Party was primarily filled with the fervour of the Civil War and the consolidation of the Soviet power, in the subsequent periods, for already fifteen years, the life and activity of our Party has been filled with fervour for the building of socialism. This fervour inspires the reports of the Central Committee of our Party.
Five times in the course of these fifteen years have the Party and the whole country heard the reports of Comrade Stalin on the activities of the Central Committee of our Party. Through all these reports the struggle for the victory of socialism in our country runs like a crimson thread. The course of this struggle is not only of historical interest. Socialism in our country is definitely and finally victorious; but the further consolidation of socialism, the struggle for the transition to the new and higher phase of communism, will demand no little effort, energy and theoretical and political comprehension of our tasks.
In the political report which Comrade Stalin made at the Fourteenth Congress of our Party, he developed and substantiated the theory of the victory of socialism in one country, smashed the Trotsky-Zinoviev plan for agrarianizing the country, and developed the general line of the offensive for socialism.
301It required a truly Leninist genius to be able, just as Lenin far back in 1903 detected that the Mensheviks were traitors to the working class, to detect, in 1923, 1924 and subsequent years, that the Trotskyites, Zinovievites and Bukharinites were traitors and enemies of the working class.
With the consolidation of the strength of the working class and the Party, the political reports of the Central Committee at the Fifteenth and the Sixteenth Congresses of our Party already outlined the task of an extended offensive of socialism along the whole front, the elimination of capitalist elements in the national economy and then the elimination of the kulaks as a class, the carrying out of the policy of universal collectivization, the industrialization of the country, the observance of Bolshevik tempo, and the fulfilment of the First Five-Year Plan in four years.
Profound theoretical depth, supreme love of the working people, hatred and contempt for their enemies, and keen revolutionary fervour for the consolidation of the might of our country and for its conversion from a backward and uncultured country into an advanced and cultured country inspired these reports of the Central Committee of our Party---the reports of our great leader, Comrade Stalin. (All rise. Loud and prolonged applause and cheers in honour of Comrade Stalin.}
The Seventeenth Congress of our Party was called the Congress of Victors, because at this congress the results of the struggle for socialism were summarized and it was established that socialism had triumphed definitely and finally. The report of the Central Committee at the Seventeenth Congress summarized the great achievements in putting into practice the Leninist-Stalinist theory that socialism can be built in one country.
Comrade Stalin's report shows that the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Party Congresses was the most important and decisive period in the history of the victories of socialism in our country.
And, indeed, comrades, during the twenty-one years the Soviet power has been in existence we have passed through the period of the conquest of political power by the proletariat and the period of the victories in the Civil War over domestic counter-revolution and foreign intervention. Then we passed through the period when beneath the political power of the proletariat was built the economic basis of socialism, a socialist foundation. During this period the world bourgeoisie hoped, on the one hand, that the Soviet power would deteriorate 302 into an ordinary bourgeois power, and, on the other, that the work of building socialism would collapse economically. As we know, these hopes ended in a complete fiasco.
In the following five years, the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses of our Party, the surrounding capitalist world, and especially its fascist vanguard, having convinced itself that socialism in our country had triumphed definitely and finally, resorted to new tactics, the tactics of undermining the socialist econopiic system, the might of our socialist state, from within, with the help of its agents and spies. The trials of the wreckers, spies and diversionists, the Trotsky-Bukharin-Zinoviev scum, the dregs of our Soviet society, showed that it was during these five years that the world bourgeoisie and its agents, with their characteristic bourgeois perfidy, adopted the policy of destroying the Soviet state from within.
During this period we were confronted not by open warfare, not by the kind of spies usually sent by foreign states, spies who do not know the language and customs of the country, but by spies, wreckers and diversionists of the most dangerous type. These were diversionists and spies who knew our conditions, who were versed in treacherous methods of fighting and who knew how to assume perfidious disguises. These spies had their own organization and carried on their wrecking work wherever they could.
It must be stated right here that our state, its very existence, would have been subjected to the gravest danger if our Stalinist Central Committee had not boldly exposed the roots of the espionage and diversionist activities of the enemy, if it had not with supreme Bolshevik determination purged our Party and the country of this filth, and if just at this period there had not been displayed the mighty power of Stalinist leadership of our Party and its ^Central Committee. (Loud applause.)
And the chief conclusion we must draw from the report of the Central Committee of our Party, from the report of Comrade Stalin, is that in this momentous and decisive period our Party and its Central Committee honourably defended the gains of socialism from the machinations of the enemy. We won because we followed the path of the great Lenin and smashed our enemies; because the Party was correctly led by the Central Committee; and because the road, with all its zigzags and difficulties, was indicated, cleared and illuminated, and new courses in theory and practice plotted by our great pilot, Comrade Stalin. (Loud cheers for Comrade Stalin; All rise. Cries of "Long live Comrade Stalin!")
303The Eighteenth Congress of our Party is a great historical landmark in the life of our country---and not of our country alone---and •that is why it was awaited by the whole country with the most profound and eager interest.
The report of the Central (Committee has disclosed what economic and political shocks the capitalist world has suffered during this period, and what a fever is now shaking the capitalist organism, despite its outwardly apparent soundness. At the same time Comrade Stalin drew a picture of the great victories of socialism in our country, the development and prosperity of our native land, and outlined the course of our foreign policy and a program of struggle for the victory of communism in the country.
Our whole Party, our whole people, cannot but welcome the line of foreign policy of our Central Committee. Our great Party is pursuing a consistent international policy worthy of the great Soviet state.
Our people cannot but be satisfied with the fact that the line of our Party and of its Central Committee, the unswerving policy of peace, is dialectically combined with the policy and practice of consolidating the defensive power of our country. (Prolonged applause.)
Comrade Stalin's report has raised the dignity of the Soviet country to a new height. It has made it clear to all our enemies, that whatever mask they .may assume, the keen eye of our Party can pierce the overt and covert instigators of war through and through, and that the wise words uttered from this platform expose and warn them in advance. The warning is a brief one. We are pursuing a policy of peace, but "we are not afraid of the threats of aggressors, and are ready to deal two blows for every blow delivered by instigators of war who attempt to violate the Soviet frontiers." (Loud and prolonged applause.) And what that means let the aggressors ask the samurai, who have had some experience of this at Lake Hassan, and to whom might be applied (the old song about a certain general. The song runs like this "Malbrouk set out for the wars," and then follows a suitable rhyme... . (Laughter and applause.) To avoid all misunderstanding and misinterpretation, let me explain that Malbrouk set out for the wars, but died of a bad attack of diarrhoea. (Laughter and applause.) This is what happened to those Japanese officers who were killed and, as we learn from Comrade Voroshilov's speech, left certain notes behind them. (Laughter.)
Comrade Stalin said that "the war has created (a new situation with regard to the relations between countries. It has enveloped them 304 in an atmosphere of alarm and uncertainty." Comrade Stalin's report fires the hearts of the working people of our country, and not of our country alone, with profound confidence that the world possesses one real armed buttress of peace---our great, mighty and invincible Soviet Union. (Loud applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Consolidation of the Economic Might of the Soviet StateYou remember Comrade Stalin's great words in his speech on the Tasks of Business Managers in 1931 about those who lag behind and get beaten, where, in a few brief phrases, he described the deplorable history of the foreign policy of tsarist Russia; how in the past backward Russia used to be beaten, and by whom. The Central Committee of our Party, the Government and Comrade Stalin have worked unflaggingly to put an end to this state of backwardness, to create a mighty force---an army---and to build up a national economy powerful enough to guarantee the Soviet state against the surprises of blockade, to make us economically independent and enable us to equip the army with everything required for victory in the struggle.
And, comrades, today we can say that this power has been created. You can see that from Comrade Stalin's report and Comrade Voroshilov's speech. The economic might of the Soviet Union is the decisive factor in the defence of the country and in the struggle for peace. During the period under review the Soviet state has made gigantic strides in all spheres .of socialist construction----in agriculture, collectivization, in industry and culture, and in the most important branch of industry, the branch which Lenin and Stalin have repeatedly said forms the basis of the national economy, and without which it would be impossible to re-equip and reconstruct the country--- namely, heavy industry.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Industrial Progress and the Fulfilment of the Task Set byComrade Stalin's report shows that in the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth .Party Congresses the Soviet Union has achieved new and- important successes in the sphere of economic development.
__PRINTERS_P_305_COMMENT__ 20-263 305At the Seventeenth Congress of the Party it was already possible to 'record that our country had become economically independent. Since the Seventeenth Congress this independence has become even more marked.
The fact of the matter is that a powerful aluminium industry, a synthetic rubber industry, an artificial fibre industry, a composition material industry and other industries have been newly created. During the period of the Second Five-Year Plan, the Central Coal Administration opened 145 new pits with an annual capacity of 74,600,000 tons, representing an increase in capacity one and a half times as large as during the First-Five-Year Plan. In the oil industry 25 new cracking plants and 15 refineries were put into operation. In the iron and steel industry, 20 new blast furnaces and 86 steel-smelting furnaces were put into operation. In the non-ferrous metal industry, the Pribalkhash Works (part) and the Central 'Urals Copper Works (part) were put into operation and construction was completed on the Chelyabinsk Zinc Works, the Northern Nickel Works and the South Urals Nickel Works. This period saw the opening of such huge plants .as the Urals, Kramatorsk and other machine-building works.
During the period under review heavy industry continued to develop at a fast rate. I need only cite certain figures regarding the output of ,the plants that came under the former People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry, including the People's Commissariat of the Machine-Building Industry (which is now not one Commissariat, but threej the People's Commissariat of the Defence Industry (which is now not one Commissariat, but four) and the six People's Commissariats which emerged from the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry already after its latest reorganization. One People's Commissariat has given birth to thirteen---you can now imagine what a ``heavy'' Commissariat it was indeed. (Laughter and applause.}
Heavy industry shows an increase of output from 15,500,000,000 rubles in 1933 to 42,500,000,000 rubles in 1938 (in 1926-27 prices), or by 175 per cent, as compared with an increase of 140 per cent in the output of the large-scale industry of our country generally.
There is no need to dwell on the importance of the growth of heavy industry. You know what significance Comrade Lenin attached to it, and how it has been fostered and developed by Comrade Stalin. The increase in output in individual branches of heavy industry is as follows: the production of lead in 1938 was 571.6 per cent of that of 1933; zinc:---506.1 per cent; aluminium---1,000 per cent (in fact, an entirely new industry has been created). The output of raw 306 copper in 1938 was 255.9 per cent of the output in 1933. The supply of automobile tires, outer covers, unfortunately, is not enough even today, especially for agriculture, and you often swear, and add, no doubt: "May you manufacturers of outer covers be left without a roof to cover you." (Laughter.) Well, anyway, the output of these automobile tires in 1938 was 566.7 per cent of the output in 1933. (Applause.)
The output of steel and rolled steel during this period has increased considerably: steel by 161.7 per cent, and rolled steeel by 163.8 per cent. At the Seventeenth Congress, Comrade Stalin set us the task of putting an end to the lag of the iron and steel industry and of increasing the output of steel and rolled steel. The output of steel and rolled steel is now over two and a half times as large as it was in 1933, but with regard to pig iron we are lagging seriously. The output of pig iron in 1938 was 205.9 per cent of that of 1933. This is more than twice as much, no small increase; nevertheless, the lag is still serious. There are many reasons for this, some of a general character and some depending on the iron and steel men themselves, but at any rate this lag must be made good.
The output of coal has increased in the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses as follows: in 1933 the output was 76,200,000 tons; in 1938 it was 132,900^000 tons. This represents an increase of 74.4 per cent.
The output of oil and gas increased in this period by 42.8 per cent. The output of refined oil increased by 53.6 per cent.
Even larger was the increase in output of light oils (benzine by 69.1 per cent, ligroin by 195.8 per cent, and kerosene by 64.9 per cent, as compared with 1933).
The machine-building industry has made considerable progress. The growth of .the defence industry has been particularly prominent. This is an indication of the attention the Party and Comrade Stalin personally pay to strengthening the defensive power of the country.
In the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Party Congresses we not only maintained the rate of development already achieved, but even surpassed it. Whereas in the period between the Sixteenth and the Seventeenth Congresses, that is, from 1930 to 1933, the average annual increase of gross output of the plants which came under ,the former People's Commissariats of Heavy Industry, the Machine-Building Industry and the Defence Industry represented 20.7 per cent, in the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses it represented 22.4 per cent. If we bear in mind that each __PRINTERS_P_307_COMMENT__ 20* 307 per cent of increased output of heavy industry represented 91,000,000 rubles in the interval between the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Congresses, and 155,000,000 rubles in the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses, .the rate of progress presents an even more striking picture. (Applause.)
The fact that we have an increase of productivity of labour is a matter of major importance. You remember the Leninist-Stalinist formulation of the question of productivity of labour as defined by Stalin in his A Year of Great Change, namely, that we must "ensure that progressive increase of productivity of labour without which the final victory of socialism over capitalism will be unthinkable." Whereas in the interval between the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Party Congresses, the increase of productivity of labour in heavy industry, not counting the seasonal branches, was 30.7 per cent, in the interval between the .Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses (1934 to 1938) it was 78.6 per cent.
Here we see the effrects, firstly, of technical reconstruction, 'the new plants and new machinery; and, secondly, of the development of the Stakhanov movement since 1935, which has yielded many valuable results. The Stakhanov movement has helped considerably in the mastering of the new technique and in raising productivity of labour---in carrying out Comrade Stalin's slogan that the fervour of construction must be supplemented by fervour in mastering the new plant and equipment. The Stakhanbvites are a new type of people "who have fully mastered the technique of their job, harnessed it and driven forward," as Stalin said"at the; All-Union "Conference of Stakhanovites. And here, the achievements have been considerable.
Thus the interval between the. Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses marks a new stage in our efforts to achieve high productivity of labour. It marks a new advance, resulting in a big victory for the socialist economic system.
Having established that "as regards technique of production and rate of growth of our industry, we have already overtaken and outstripped the principal capitalist countries," Comrade Stalin strongly stressed the fact that "we are still lagging economically, that is, as regards the volume of our industrial output per head of population.''
I think, comrades, that the Congress and the whole Party will welcome this new presentation of the question by Comrade Stalin. We must realize the momentous significance of the new Stalinist task of overtaking and outstripping the principal capitalist countries 308 economically. It marks a new phase in the life of our country and in socialist construction.
Comrade Stalin's new and great slogan will serve to mobilize the whole Party, the whole country and the whole people not to be content with what has already been achieved, but to overtake and outstrip the capitalist countries:economically in the next ten or fifteen yearsr This is no narrow practical task; it is linked up with the task of achieving an abundance of products and of ensuring the transition \p the higher phase of communism. We are convinced that we shall accomplish this general task, just* as we have hitherto accomplished all the grand tasks set Us by our great Stalin, (Prolonged applause.)
During these ten or fifteen years we must outstrip the principal capitalist countries in all branches, especially in the fuel industry (coarand oil), which economically are lagging more than the branches of heavy industry mentioned in the theses of Comrade Molotov's report on the Third Five-Year Plan of which he will speak here.
Our rate of development is greater than that of other countries; this also applies to such branches as coal and oil. But, comrades, as you know we inherited a poverty-stricken country and are therefore lagging economically.
As regards coal and oil, we have an extremely arduous and difficult task to perform.
We must in ten or fifteen years make good the lag at all costs. I am absolutely certain that we shall do this in the time set by Comrade Stalin. (Applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Complete Mastery and Expansion of ProductiveSince the Seventeenth Party Congress we have undoubtedly made great strides in the way of utilizing the production capacities of our plants. The electric power stations, for example, are working with great tenseness. The increase is considerable; in 1934 every installed unit of capacity operated 4,017 hours; in 1937 it operated 5,530 hours, and in many poWer stations even more---more than in America, Germany and England. I would even say that in the case of some of the power stations the ``achievement'' is excessive. If we had capacity reserves, we would not be working our plant so hard; however, it shows that our people are trying to get the most out of the plant. As regards the coal industry, the output of a cuttingmachine in the Donetz Basin rose from 2,100 tons in 1933 to 3,000 309 tons in 1938. But the increase is not enough. There are cutting-- machine operators, men like Kretov, who cut about 18,000 tons per machine instead of 3,000. This shows how much can still be done to raise the output of a cutting-machine.
In the oil industry, drilling speed rose from 108.3 metres in 1932 to 459.9 metres in 1937. But here too the increase is far too small. We have large reserves and potentialities which must be utilized to the full.
, In the iron and steel industry, the volumetric index of efficiency of blast furnaces improved from 1.75 in 1932 to 1.14 in 1938. Steel yield per sq. metre of hearth rose from 2.8 tons in 1933 to 4.64 tons in 1938.
However, there are plants where the efficiency index of the blast furnace is: Krivoy Rog---0.94; the Stalin Works in Kuznetsk^0.95; the Kirov Works in Makeyevka----0.98. This shows that better utilization is possible. The same could be said of the steel furnaces.
There has also been an improvement in utilization of production capacities in the chemical industry, which has done a lot to intensify output. But what huge reserves we have here is shown, for example, by the fact that while there are plants which in i938 secured an average daily yield of 74 kilograms (Voikov Works) and 70.1 kilograms (Vinnitsa Works) of sulphuric acid per cubic metre of lead tower, the majority of the plants show a yield of less than 40 kilograins, and some even less than 30 kilograms.
Quite a number of similar examples could be cited in respect to the machine-building industry, the defence industry and other branches. However, it must be emphatically stated that, in spite of certain achievements in the mastering of new technique, in spite of increased productivity and the improved knowledge of our engineers and technicians, who already have a large and solid experience, the majority of our industrial plants and transport services still have inexhaustible reserves, and there are still grave shortcomings in respect to the full utilization of the production capacities of our plants.
In order to increase the amount of products per head of population, we must increase output. That is clear. In order to increase output, we must, in addition to building new plants, pay particular attention to the proper utilization of the plants already built or reconstructed.
It is no use concealing the fact that we still have quite a number of executives who are prepared to attribute the shortcomings which prevent the capacity of their plants being fully utilized and more 310 goods being produced to various outside causes---in a word, to the neighbour. The neighbour is to blame. (Laughter.)
It is true that sometimes there is not enough equipment, and that sometimes neighbours do cause difficulties---these defects too must be removed---but attention must be turned above all to those defects in the organization of production which can be removed without any big expenditure of funds or effort, thus resulting in an increase of output and enabling the best to be made of the plants that the laws of technology and economic^ permit.
I think that there are very few executives as yet who can assert that they get the most out of their plants. Still less can this be said of the new and reconstructed plants, which already predominate in a number of industries.
For example, in 1936 the proportion of output obtained from new or entirely reconstructed plants to total output was: in the iron and steel industry 96.6 per cent, in the chemical industry 95.2 per cent, and in the electric power industry 90.8 per cent.
This new plant and machinery must be harnessed, mastered. Unfortunately, not all has been done that could be in this respect.
The Stakhanov movement has shown what enormous potentialities are latent in our industry and agriculture. It is true that the Stakhanov movement and the realization of these potentialities have not given as palpable results in the period under review as they might; but the fact that the results of the Stakhanov movement have nol been fully consolidated in a number of branches does not mean that these potentialities are illusory. It only shows that many of our executives were unprepared and slow in carrying out the demands of the Central Committee of our Party regarding leadership of the Stakhanov movement.
Now that we are being assigned the new and highly important task of outstripping the capitalist countries economically, and of considerably increasing the output of goods per head of population, this is precisely the time to strive with even greater tenacity to further the Stakhanov movement, to make the best results obtained by the foremost Stakhanovites widespread, and to utilize those vast potentialities which have been disclosed by the Stakhanovites and which are actually being utilized by the Stakhanovites in our best industrial plants and transport services.
We must combine the honest and conscientious fulfilment of the decision of the Council of People's Commissars of the U.S.S.R., the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), and the All-Union Central 311 Trade Union Council regarding labour discipline, and our fight against undisciplined elements and shirkers with the work of organizing the masses for a further advance of the Stakhanov movement and the shock work movement. But this means improving the organization of the (production process, providing the worker with a suitable work-place, instruments, raw material and electric power, arid ensuring the coordinated and harmonious running of all the shops of the plant, pf all the; sections of the shop---in a mine, for example, cutting, loading, propping,^hauling, raising, supply of tubs, and so on. - A highly important -factor in improving the operation of our plants is to give a greater measure of authority to the men who have the immediate charge of units---shop superintendents, foremen, gang leaders, section superintendents.
Speaking of-the middle and lower industrial executives at the reception given to steel men and coal men on October 29,> 1937, Comrade Stalin said:
``We have tens of thousands of these small and middle executives. They are modest people, they are unobtrusive, they are almost unnoticed. But it would be blindness not to notice them. For on these people depends the fate of production in every branch of our economic life. Consequently, on them depends the fate of our economic leadership.''
Comrade Stalin convened a narrow conference of representatives of factories and industrial People's Commissariats specially to discuss the question of enhancing the authority of foremen. Unfortunately, I must say that so far executives have not shown the necessary energy in this respect.
The authority of foremen, section superintendents, gang leaders and shop superintendents must be raised. They must be given the power to award good workers; they must be endowed with greater powers in engaging and dismissing workers, they must be the real commanders in the shop, shift or gang.
We must undoubtedly correct the .state of affairs that exists in a number of plants, where foremen earn less than skilled workers.
The fight against breakdowns and stoppages is of the highest importance in securing the normal running of plants, and therefore the proper performance of their jobs by all workers, and, consequently, the best utilization of production capacities. It must be plainly stated that breakdowns and stoppages are a veritable scourge hindering smooth and normal work in a number of branches, including coal 312 mining, the iron and steel industry, and even machine-building, not to mention transport.
The chief "thing is to prevent breakdowns, arid this depends on the organizers of production, who frequently merely register breakdowns as they occur, instead of taking measures to prevent them. Yet the quality of an executive is tested by what he does to prevent breakdowns. The People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry issued an order on registration and measures to combat breakdowns, arid this is the way Sirenko, the chief of one of the Central Administrations of the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry, carried out this order. To save himself trouble, this Sirenko signed blarik breakdown report forms for several days ahead. These blank's Were - then to be filled in by a clerk. But one day, the clerk; by mistake, sent in, instead of a report, a blank form already signed by Sirenko. This blank form was drawn to my attention, and of course such a ``fighter'' against breakdowns as this Sirenko was relieved of the arduous duty of signing blank forms. (Laughter.) Unfortunately, such ``fighters'' against breakdowns are hot yet extinct. It is time we executives seriously tackled the job of preventing breakdowns.
One grave defect that often leads to stoppages and breakdowns and causes great loss to the state is the poor repair of machinery, with the result that our productive plant gets prematurely worn out.
This year the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and the Council of People's Commissars adopted an important decision regarding the repair of machinery, and provided the funds and materials for the purpose. Executives must make full use of this important decision and ensure the best care of machinery and tend it as if it were a living organism. Timely repairs, proper maintenance, and care for the efficient employment of machinery, so that workers, foremen and gang leaders operating the machinery should not damage it, will contribute largely to the better utilization of the capacities of plants and thus to an increased output of goods.
Unfortunately, it must be said that cost accounting is not playing the part it should in securing the smooth running of plants; for only smooth running and better utilization of plant capacities can lead to good financial results. Breakdowns, stoppages, wastage of raw material and the payment of workers when they do not produce, even if at reduced rates, always result in losses and financial difficulties.
Special reference should be made to the question of giving effect to proposals for improvements, proposals for technical perfections and inventions, made by Stakhanovites, by our talented young engineers 313 and technicians, for output can be increased not only by building new factories, but also by improving the work of the old factories, and, moreover, with a minimum expenditure of money, effort and building materials.
A big potentiality in respect to mastering and increasing existing capacities lies in the intensification and rationalization of our industry, the introduction of modern innovations. How much can we still obtain in this way? It may be said without exaggeration---thousands of millions of rubles.
I will give a few examples!
We must increase the output of pig iron. But must this be done only by building new iron and steel plants, which cost many millions? We can obtain a huge additional quantity of pig iron by the use of oxygen blast in iron smelting. We are now building a small blast furnace in Dniepropetrovsk with an oxygen installation. This will be ah experiment, but what may it yield? By the use of oxygen blast, the efficiency of blast furnaces may be doubled. Hence we can double the output of pig iron by using oxygen blast. And this is cheaper than building new blast furnaces. The efficiency of blast furnaces can be improved to 0.5, instead of 1.14, in other words,, more than doubled. The adoption of this process will make it possible to reduce the expenditure of coke per ton of pig iron by 10 or 15 per cent. The use of oxygen enriches the process and yields a pig iron of higher quality, thus making it possible to produce higher-grade metal.
Thus the use of this method alone---the oxygen blast---can result in a marked increase of capacity.
Case-hardening of steel may also yield immense results. Professor Vologdin and Professor Heveling have each worked out a method of case-hardening. Take rails, for example. We need millions of tons of them. Rails wear out chiefly at the joints. Well, rajls may be casehardened, in the first place at the joints, which will greatly increase their durability.
Case-hardening can be used on any metal and results in a huge saving of metal, for it will increase the durability of tools, spares and machine parts. There are other new methods: for example, methods of tempering tools which double their strength and durability and reduce the expenditure of rare metals.
Of great importance is the method of rolling steel without casting it into ingots. At present, after being smelted, the metal is poured into moulds; then, before being fed to the rolling mills, the ingots are again heated in the furnace. But metal can be rolled without being 314 cast mto ingots, thus obviating the necessity for pouring the molten metal into moulds and heating the ingots. This will considerably increase the output of the rolling mills.
Take electric power stations. In America, turbines are now being installed, and high-pressure turbines at that, in annexes to the old power stations. Moreover, the waste steam from the high-pressure turbines is used for low-pressure turbines. If we confine ourselves to building new power stations, erecting all the necessary new buildings for them, all the dwelling houses, and so on, we shall suffer from a shortage of power stations for many years to come. We must therefore borrow this method.
In the chemical industry, too, there are quite a number of potentialities which could, if utilized, considerably raise the output. What can be done by inventions is shown by one example. The executives asked for 1,500,000,000 rubles for the building of new plant to increase the output of chemicals. When we refused and ordered them to find other ways of raising output, the comrades began to look about them, and it was found that an invention by rank-and-file engineers had been lying in the files of the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry for several years, an invention that would make it possible to obtain the output required with an expenditure of only 50,000,000 rubles instead of 1,500,000,000 rubles. A slight saving of 1,450,000,000 rubles. (Laughter.) Let it be said to the honour of women, that the moving spirit in this invention was a woman engineer. (Applause.)
There are things---not even things, properly speaking---like smoke, which can be used as- a raw material in the chemical industry. Smoke is smoke; but we can use it, and should use it, to obtain good chemical products, products we need. (Applause.) There are similar potentialities in the non-ferrous metal industry.
There are big opportunities of economizing fuel on the railways, in the locomotives. The railways consume 110,000 or 120,000 tons of coal per day. They are one of the largest coal consumers. Yet the efficiency of a locomotive is very low. And so, comrades, if we work on this problem, and we are working on it---we are already manufacturing condenser-locomotives which economize 25 or 28 per cent of coal---we can achieve a big saving. An inventor, a former locomotive driver named Trofimov, and his three sons are now working on the designs of a steam engine which he calculates should result in a 25 or 30 per cent economy of fuel even on the old locomotives.
Then there are other things like the exhaust steam, which is wasted on leaving the cylinder. It is now possible to direct it to the 315 tender, where it heats the water to 95° C. The .result is a 20 or 22 per cent economy of fuel on the locomotive.
We also have a great many valuable inventions in coal mining, but we are^^1^^ very slow in realizing them. We have cutting-machines which hew the coal, and that is all. But we must also meqjiamze loading, for delay in mechanizing^^1^^ loading the hewn coal is affecting the output, not to mention the fact that loading without machinery is hard work. We already have a machine which both cuts and loads---a coal combine: It is time to manufacture this combine on a mass scale. It is -already being partially used in the form of a cuttingmachine with a bent bar, which ;nqt only cuts the coal but also strips it.
We ,are also suffering from lack of machinery in the sinking of shafts. There is now a machine thai facilitates this work. Shafts can be sunk five times as fast as at present. This machine must be introduced on a wide scale and the development of mines thus expedited and cheapened.
Hydraulic machinery, by which the coal is cut by a stream of water, can also be used. Experiments made in the Kizel coalfield show that the hydro-monitor is from seven to ten times as efficient as the pneumatic pick. In the hydraulic process the coal is washed on the spot, cleaned of all dross and thus enriched. The result is that a high-grade coal is obtained.
Peat cutting is greatly affected by its seasonal character. There is now a process of dehydrating peat which permits cutting all the year round. We have already started to build plants for the artificial dehydration of peat; they will produce a high-grade product in the form of briquettes. How important peat is, especially high-grade peat, can be seen from the fact that it has already been proved that .blast furnaces can be run on peat instead of coke and a pig iron obtained free of sulphur and phosphorous, just as when charcoal is used for smelting.
A most valuable invention in the oil industry is the turbine drill on which we have already been working for ten years. At present, when sinking wells we use what is known as the rotary drill. This requires the use" of drilling pipes. You can imagine it---the oil lies at a depth of two kilometres or more; in order to get at it a well must be drilled. Pipes are sunk into the grovtnd, and these pipes, sometimes to a depth of two kilometres, are rotated by a machine, and the drilling done by a bit. Accidents often occur to the pipes, the bit breaks, and in order to replace it the pipes have to be withdrawn to the surface. In the process of work the pipes get worn by 316 friction and are spoilt. Cases often occur like the one I myself observed in Baku: a depth of 1,860 metres had been reached; only five or ten metres remained to be drilled when the bit broke and the whole work was wasted. It took months to fish out the bit and pieces of pipe.
In the turbine-drilling process the pipes will serve only as a guide. A,small turbine drill is lowered into the pipe with a bit attached. This turbine drill is driven with the help of a solution of clay, which is circulated through the pipe to the bit to facilitate drilling. This is a hydro-turbine in the full sense, of the word. It is now possible to use the turbine drill to a depth of 1,300 or 1,400 metres.. We are planning to make wide use of turbine drilling in the eastern oil fields.
There are also important inventions in oil refining. The use of alloy pipes alone increases the yield of benzine. The use of combined cracking installations increases the benzine yield from the light sulphur oils of the Eas.t to 45 or 47 per cent.
We have a large number of outstanding inventions of this kind in every branch of industry, including machine-building.
Comrade Stalin has repeatedly drawn the attention of the industrial People's Commissariats to the necessity of showing greater interest in inventions and inventors. Executives must give the utmost support and encouragement to inventors and supply them with all they require for their work.
In addition to utilizing and widely applying our own inventions, we must take over every technical innovation there is abroad. We have an advantage over the capitalist countries with regard to the introduction of innovations. We began to develop industry later than the capitalist countries. This not only has its drawbacks but also its advantages, because, building from the bottom up, we have every opportunity of adopting the anost up-to-date technical achievements. In order to carry out the task set by Comrade Stalin of outstripping the principal capitalist countries economically, we shall have to do a lot of building, and we must install the most modern machinery in the new plants.
New plants must be built more quickly and cheaply. For example, it used to take six or eight years to sink a new pit. This year we started sinking four pits and finished them in ten months. This was done by employing express methods of building.
If we want to accomplish the huge new construction program, we must introduce the express method of building on a broad scale, 317 we must make wide use of machinery. Building must be raised to a higher level.
Both for the construction >and operation of plants that are being built or extended, we shall require labour power. Here the collective farms must come to our aid. Comrade Stalin, in his report, appealed to the collective farms to supply labour power for industry.
Comrade Stalin's appeal to the collective farms is of the utmost importance to the life of our country and to the whole work of socialist construction. We are convinced that the collective farms will respond to Comrade Stalin's appeal and furnish labour power for our industry.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Further Development of the Fuel IndustryThere is no need to show that it is of the utmost importance for further economic development to put an end to the lagging state of the fuel industry. Permit me therefore to deal with this question speciall v,.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Progress of the Fuel IndustryDuring the period under review, that is, from the Seventeenth Congress to the Eighteenth Congress, the output of the coal industry has increased from 76,200,000 tons in 1933 to 132,900,000 tons in 1938, or by 74.4 per cent.
The movement of output in the various coalfields of the Soviet Union in the period 1934-38 was as follows:
In the Donetz coalfield output increased from 59,700,000 tons in 1934 to 78,300,000 tons in 1938, or by 31.2 per cent.
In the Kuznetsk coalfield output increased from 11,200,000 tons in 1934 to 16,800,000 tons in 1938, or by 50 per cent. •
In the Khakass coalfield output increased from 452,000 tons in 1934 to 855,000 tons in 1938, or by 89.2 per cent.
'Ijn the Moscow coalfield output increased from 4,620,000 tons in 1934 to 7,400,000 tons in 1938, or by 60.2 per cent.
In the Karaganda coalfield output increased from 1,830,000 tons in 1934 to 4,150,000 tons in 1938, or by 126.8 per cent.
In the Urals coalfield output increased from 5,480,000 tons in 1934 to 8,060,000 in 1938, or by 47.1 per cent.
318In the East fSiberian coalfield output increased from 2,320,000 tons in 1934 to 3,640,000 tons in 1938, or by 56.9 per cent.
In the Tkvibuli coalfield output increased from 231,000 tons in 1934 to 261,000 tons in 1938, or by 13 per cent.
In the Tkvarcheli coalfield output in 1938 was 85.6 per cent more than in 1935.
These figures show that we have a certain general increase and that other coalfields besides the Donetz Basin are growing, but not enough^ The increase in coal output is still far from commensurate with the increase in output of the most important branches of industry---the coal consumers. I particularly feel this as one of the biggest consumers of coal. But, unfortunately, it is not always easy for me to lodge a complaint---from the People's Commissariat of Railways to the People's Commissar of the Fuel Industry, Comrade Kaganovich. (Laughter.)
The tasks facing us in the coal industry are as follows.
First, to increase the output of coal so as to fully meet the demand.
Second, to develop the extraction of coal wherever it is to be found. And it is to be found everywhere in our country, from the Pacific to the Urals, in the Caucasus, in the Ukraine (brown coal), in Kazakhstan, in Central Asia and in the North (Pechora). We have coal in abundance (over 20 per cent of the world's coal deposits are to be found in the U.:S,S,R.). The total coal reserves of the U.S.S.R. amount to 1,654,361,000,000 tons. The deposits of the Kuznetsk' field alone amount to 450,000,000,000 tons.
Yet coal mining in our country is very unevenly distributed. In 1938 the Donetz Basin, which possesses 5.4 per cent of the total coal deposits of the U.S.S.R., accounted for 58.9 per cent of the coal output of the country.
It should be stated that Comrade Stalin is always urging us to solve this problem and put an end to this unevenness. There are coal deposits everywhere, in all the regions. We must mine it wherever it is to be found.
The Third Five-Year Plan provides for a big increase of output in the new coalfields (Moscow, Urals, Central Asia, Far Eastern Territory, Orsk and elsewhere)-, all the more that a number of these fields, the Moscow one for example, have been making no progress for several years.
Quite recently Comrade Stalin specially instructed us to work out plans for the Moscow coalfield.
The People's Commissariat of the Fuel Industry has worked out 319 a plan for developing this coalfield and raising the average daily output from 22,000 tons to 50,000 tons in 1940, and to 100,000 tons in the second half of 1942. High rates of development are envisaged for other coalfields as well.
The new construction work outlined in the Third Five-Year Plan will alter the relative output of the various coalfields coming under the People's Commissariat of the Fuel Industry as follows:
The output of the Donetz coalfield will be raised to 113,800,000 tons in 1942, but the relative proportion of the output of this coalfield to total output will be reduced by that year to 48.7 per cent. The relative proportion of output in all the other coalfields will increase.
The output of the Moscow coalfield will increase to 35,000,000 tons in 1942, and its relative proportion to 15 per cent.
The output of the Urals coalfield will increase to 25,900,000 tons in 1942, and its relative proportion to 11.1 per cent.
The output of the coalfields of the Far Eastern Territory will increase to 9,000,000 tons in 1942, and its relative proportion to 3.9 per cent.
The output of coal in Central Asia will increase to 4,700,000 tons in 1942, and its relative proportion to 2 per cent.
The output of coal in the Caucasus will increase to 2,200,000 tons in 1942, and its relative proportion to 0.9 per cent.
Comrade Stalin has set us the problem of developing industry along the Volga,, but he pointed out that there is no coal there and that the output of Dombarovo coal should therefore be developed. This is good anthracite coal, lying near the city of Chk'alov. We are beginning to sink pits; ten will be sunk this year. By 1942 we are to have collieries here with an aggregate capacity of 6,000,000 tons. There are coal deposits near the Caspian Sea, what is known as the Mangyshlak coalfield ni Kazakhstan. It should be developed and the coal carried by water along the Volga.
In addition, the geologists consider that the Donetz coalfield stretches as far as Stalingrad. Prospecting must be expedited and coal mining developed there.
Comrade Stalin shows special interest in the development of the Pechora coalfield. This field must be developed to supply the North and Leningrad by building a railway from Ukhta to Pechora and shipping 'Coal and oil (there is also oil there) to the centre of the country and to Leningrad. At present we carry, coal from the Donetz Basin to the Far North and to Archangel. It will of course be much easier to ship Ukhta-Pechora coal to these places.
320In the third five-year period, in addition to opening up and developing the new fields, pits will be sunk in the Donetz and Kuznetsk coalfields, but the relative output of the Donetz coalfield will decline.
By 1942 (inclusive) the People's Commissariat of the Fuel Industry has to build and put into operation 573 pits, with an aggregate capacity of 166,500,000 tons, or over twice as much as in the period of the Second Five-Year Plan.
The number of pits it is planned to build and put into operation in the third five-year period in the various coalfields is as follows: Donetz Basin---157 pits, with an aggregate capacity of 58,800,000 tons; brown coal of the Ukraine---3 pits, aggregate capacity 600,000 tons; North Caucasus and Transcaucasia---12 pits, aggregate capacity 1,950,000 tons; Moscow coalfield---121 pits, aggregate capacity 37,700,000 tons; Urals---60 pits, aggregate capacity 18,630,000 tons; Orsk-Dombarovo coalfield---55 pits, aggregate capacity 6,000,000 tons; Kuznetsk and Khakass---39 pits, aggregate capacity 13,110,000 tons; Karaganda---19 pits, aggregate capacity 7,750,000 tons; Eastern coalfields---21 pits, aggregate capacity 2,540,000 tons; East Siberian coalfields---5 pits, aggregate capacity 2,340,000 tons; Burein coalfield--- 10 pits, aggregate capacity 2,550,000 tons; Sakhalin---5 pits, aggregate capacity 800,000 tons; Far Eastern coalfields---34 pits, aggregate capacity 7,810,000 tons; Central Asia---32 pits, aggregate capacity 5,970,000 tons.
This is a big task. It will need the assistance of the Party organizations, not to mention the assistance which the Government and the Central Committee of the Party are giving in the accomplishment of this complex task.
No coalfield, however small, is being left out of sight, nor should it be.
The mining of coal deposits of a local character should be developed to the utmost, and this is a job which the Soviet foodies in the localities must also tackle themselves.
We must accelerate the sinking of pits. They must be sunk, not in five, six or eight years, as was formerly the case, but in ten or twelve months.
The next important problem in the coal industry is mechanization. Everybody knows how hard the labour of a miner is. Mechanization lightens his labour and increases his output.
The coal industry has no small amount of machinery. But not all the processes are equally mechanized. .While in the Donetz Basin __PRINTERS_P_321_COMMENT__ 21---263 321 the proportion of machine-out coal is high (94.6 per cent), there is a marked lag in mechanization of haulage along mainways (horse haulage amounts to 56.5 per cent), filling tubs and goaf packing (not mechanized at all), and loading into railway cars (30 per cent hand loading).
In order to secure the equable mechanization of all processes, we need electric locomotives and must manufacture combines and loading machinery on a large scale.
A highly important factor is the better utilization of existing pits and their mechanical equipment.
But in order that a cutting-machine operator, a hewer, or a timberman may attain a high level of productivity, his place at the coalface must first be put in working order. The preliminary work in a mine---the driving of drifts, slopes, etc.---actually amounts to the renewal of the mine.
We have thousands of splendid (miners in the coal industry--- first-class men, Stakhanovites, who are already fulfilling and overfulfilling even the new standards of output. However, in a number of pits, although there are a great many individual Stakhanovite hewers, timbermen, and others who are doing their jobs well, the coal output of the pit is low, and a number of pits are not even fulfilling their plan. Their work is hampered by bad organization, lack of coordination. And this coordination can be ensured only by adhering to a cycle schedule, the axis of which is the cutting-machine, or, rather, its cycle of operation (from the beginning of one run to the beginning of another). The number of cutting-machine cycles must be increased.
The most valuable result achieved by the Stakhanov movement in the coal industry during the past year is the fact that we now have a number of pit sections and even whole mines which have managed to ensure coordination of processes, a larger number of cycles and higher coal output; that we have outstanding organizers of Stakhanovite cooperation in operating the cycle schedule, as Shashatsky, Gvozdyrkov and Kornienko, to mention a few.
Highly interesting is the experience of the Stalin Pit of the Snezhnyan Anthracite Trust in the Donetz Basin, where Shashatsky worked. This pit used to operate badly. It fell into the hands of wreckers. Today it is one of the front-rank pits, and its workers as a body have been awarded the Order of Lenin.
In his huge run of coalface, 350 meters long, Shashatsky has achieved a daily cycle and has raised output to 1,000 tons per day 322 from this one section. Other sections of the mine have begun to. follow Shashatsky's example and are working much better.
Cycle operation and the coordinated working of the whole personnel has resulted in a big increase in the number of Stak'hanovites and Master Coalminers.
In 1936 only 38 men in the Stalin Pit had earned the title of Master Coalminer. In 1937 this title had already been conferred on 328 miners. The number rose to 602 in 1938, and to 730 in January 1939.
A high degree of cycle operation not only means increased coal output, but greater prosperity for the miners. Earnings have increased. In this same mine, the Stalin Pit, average earnings in 1934 were 220 rubles, while in 1938 they were 552 rubles.
Comrade Kretov, a. cutting-machine operator, earns an average of 3,000 rubles a month. Other cutting-machine operators in this mine are earning over 2,000 rubles a month.
The mine has its club, children's creches and kindergartens.
I must frankly state that the mine has only one serious drawback. That is the shortage of houses for the growing number of married men. Marriages are steadily increasing. For example, 81 couples married in 1935, and 184 in 1938.
There has also been an increase in the birth rate. In 1935, 517 children were born. In 1938 the number had risen to 860. (Applause.)
As you see, the miners are employing the cycle and complete coordination principles hi all spheres of activity. (Laughter and applause.)
What is preventing an increase in the number of cycles in all mines? Unsatisfactory organization of work, stoppages and breakdowns. The losses caused by breakdowns are considerable.
Full use iniust be made of all potentialities for increased output that may be derived from increasing the number of cycles and from more efficient use of machinery, all' the more since the seasonal departure of workers for the countryside customary in the coal industry has already begun.
Educational work must be carried on among the miners individually; measures must be taken to induce them to remain on permanent employment in the mines (by individual contracts); dwelling construction must be extended. Secondly, in order to compensate for possible departures of workers, work must be better organized and discipline strengthened by unswervingly carrying out the decision of the Council of People's Commissars of the U.S.S.R., the Central __PRINTERS_P_323_COMMENT__ 21* 323 Committee of the C.P.S.U.(6.) and the All-Union Central Trade Union Council of December 28, 1938.
The coalminers have shown a big improvement latterly.
The executive personnel of the coal industry have been renewed. They are a source of our strength; but not all of them have yet mastered the art of organization.
Comrades miners, on the initiative of Comrade Stalin, the government has awarded you. Comrade Stalin knows how difficult the work of a miner is, and he has the highest respect for the miner and his labour. A large number of men in the coal industry have received rewards, but this lays many obligations on the coal men. Miners are a sturdy, self-confident and energetic breed. There are many very capable men among them who are fulfilling three or four times the standard of output. There are many fine Stakhanovites among them. They must not yield ground this summer. Let them learn a lesson this summer from the railwaymen who recovered so quickly from the three weeks of difficulty caused this winter by the sudden severe frosts all over the Soviet Union. They organized competition, with the result that this winter they worked quite well, and on a number of railways even splendidly, so that the February plan was overfulfilled. Never have loadings on the railways gone so well under winter conditions, both as to quantity and quality, as this year. In particular, 16,000 cars of coal were loaded per day. If the railwaymen have made such a good showing and have stood the test of winter, then it is now the turn of the coalminers to stand the test of spring and summer. There should be competition along these lines between the railwaymen and miners. (Applause.}
An important potentiality with regard to the supply of fuel and power is the gas industry. This is a new branch of industry and it has a big future before it. It is, as it were, an industry of the communist society.
We have set ourselves the aim of creating a powerful gas industry, as a new branch, by exploiting natural deposits of gas, widely developing the underground gasification of coal and the gasification of small deposits of fuel for local supply. Plans are being made to prospect and exploit gas deposits in the central regions, the Middle Volga, in the Ukraine, and in the southern regions.
.Special attention is being given to the underground gasification of coal, which, as Lenin said, will cause "a revolution in industry.''
Comrade Stalin is now giving special attention to this question.
Underground gasification consists in converting the power of coal 324 into the power of combustible gas, directly in the coal seam itself. Two or more shafts are sunk from the surface to the slope of the seam, and these shafts are connected up by a horizontal gallery. A blast of air, steam, mixture of steam and oxygen, etc., is directed down one of the shafts, and, passing over the burning coal seam (the fire face), is converted into combustible gas which emerges through the neighbouring shaft. The gases obtained from the underground gasification of coal may be used: a) for power purposes as a gas fuel---in particular, for gas automobiles and gas motors, and b) for technological purposes as a raw material for the chemical industry.
Capitalism has been unable to develop underground gasification owing to the contradictions which rend it. It has proved within the reach of our country only. We have solved the problem of underground gasification and it is being applied in practice at the Gorlovka Experimental Station, whose young and talented builders have been awarded distinctions by the government.
Underground gasification is a great thing. It eliminates the most arduous underground toil, and it must be converted from an experiment into a regular industry. A number of districts will then secure cheap fuel. Moscow, for example, will obtain gas from its own coalfields. It will be delivered to Moscow by pipe, instead of coal being hauled long distances.
Of great importance is the shale industry. Shale is not only a power-producing fuel but also an excellent raw material for the production of gas and liquid fuel. The industry must be developed around Leningrad and along the Volga.
The peat industry is already one of our important sources of fuel supply. But it must be further developed, not only from the economic standpoint, but also technically, and, even more so, morally. The peat industry has hitherto been regarded as one of our most backward branches, partly owing to its seasonal 'character. But this is unjustified. In 1937 it had already been 82.8 per cent mechanized. True, not all processes are mechanized equally. Since peat extraction bears a seasonal character, its mechanization must be extended.
Regions and territories where the peat industry exists---the Ivanovo region, which has done quite well with peat, the Yaroslavl, Sverdlovsk, Moscow, Leningrad and other regions---must devote particular attention to peat extraction.
325 __ALPHA_LVL2__ Progress in the Oil IndustryThe,re is no need to explain the importance of oil. Everybody knows that we cannot now regard oil merely from the standpoint of fuel and power. Everybody knows that without oil we cannot have tractors. And no tractors means no grain or cotton. Without oil we cannot have automobiles and aircraft.
The output of oil (including oil gas) has increased by nearly 50 per cent in the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses, the biggest increase being in the new regions of the East ---the Bashkir oil field and the Kama oil field.
Two important tasks face us in the oil industry: a) to develop production so as to fully satisfy the demand, and b)-to develop oil production to the utmost in the East, to create a "Second Baku" there.
We have large oil deposits, especially in the new regions, but production in these regions is still insufficiently developed. Whereas Azerbaijan has 29 per cent of the total oil reserves of the Soviet Union, its output is 74.5 per cent of the total output of the country. On the other hand, all the other regions, which together possess 71 per cent of the total oil reserves of the Soviet Union, produce only 25.5 per cent of the total output. We carry oil from Baku thousands of miles, when as a matter of fact there is oil in Buguruslan, Ishimbayevo, Syzran and other eastern regions.
In order to solve the oil problem by the end of 1942, it is proposed to increase the output of crude oil by 60 per cent, which will make it fully possible to satisfy the demand for a number of oil products.
The development of the oil extraction industry is guided by the prime aim of creating a "Second Baku" in the East.
It should be stated that in the period of the Second Five-Year Plan the proportionate output of Azerbaijan oil increased. This was due to the fact that Grozny fell down heavily in oil output. While developing oil output in Baku, we must at the same time expedite the development of the eastern oil fields.
We must carry out Stalin's great and magnificent slogan of creating a "Second Baku." Big progress is planned in the Emba, Ishimbayevo, Tuimaza, Syzran, the Kama oil fields, the oil fields of the Turkmen S.S.R., Uzbek S.S.R., and other new regions. The proportionate output of the eastern regions will increase from 6.5 per cent jat present to 21.8 per cent by the end of 1942.
For'example, we are late with the construction of the Ufa refinery, and this has held back the production of oil in Ishimbayevo. I must 326 tell you that it required special pressure on the part of Comrade Stalin to get oil extraction in Ishimbayevo developed to the full and the construction of the Ufa refinery expedited. The work is now in full swing.
We must also accelerate prospecting and exploitation in the new oil fields of Georgia, in the Ukraine and in all regions where there are signs of oil and gas in several places. Drilling is of the utmost importance in the oil industry. Without it there can be no increase in the number of wells and, consequently, no increase in oil output. We are undertaking a big drilling program.
The development of a "Second Baku" in the East will entail a vast amount of construction work, and in this, considerable help must be given by the Party organizations in these oil regions. I must say that whatever current defects there may have been in the Baku oil industry, the Baku Party organization and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan are keenly alive to oil and are fighting for oil. The Party organizations of the eastern regions must fight for oil like the Baku comrades.
As regards drilling, our task is to improve its technique and organization. Retrograde, anti-mechanization views are more prevalent in respect to drilling than in any other branch of the oil industry.
The drilling plan for 1938 was not fulfilled. We have now raised the drilling standards. A stop must be put to breakdowns in drilling; the introduction of turbine drills must be expedited. Drilling must be brought up to the mark as soon as possible.
There are great opportunities for improvement in the operation of the oil wells.
The chief thing here is to Institute a proper technological regime for the wells, to ensure their constant and steady operation and the maximum output of oil.
When I visited Grozny and found that an oil well was producing half a ton or so a day, I asked the engineers and geologists why a bigger output could not be obtained. "It's the technological regime," they replied.
So I said to them: "Well, if we abolished the tsarist regime, it would be funny if we could not improve your technological regime." (Laughter and prolonged applause.}
And we set about improving it; and this same well, after we had put a geologist to supervise it, began to yield three tons of oil a day. Wells are in the habit of getting choked with sand. They have to be cleaned, and if they are not cleaned the oil will not flow, of course. 327 But wells are still being cleaned badly, and generally they are not being tended as they should. Too much reliance is put on gushers. A well is drilled, and at first the oil gushes; no pumps or compressors are required; the well needs no attention, yet it will produce 300 tons a day. Fine! But there is a danger of unsteady output, for the capacity of the well rapidly declines, and the output becomes extremely unsteady.
It is time we adopted the American practice of reviving oil wells. In America, a marked increase in the yield of an oil seam is obtained by this method. It consists in artificially injecting into a so-called ``exhausted'' seam gas, air, water, etc., under pressure, or sometimes at a high temperature. The effect in certain of the American oil fields has been to increase output by as much as 60 per cent.
Experiments made with this method in the Maikop oil field have been very successful.
The wide adoption of this method will permit a big increase in oil output from the so-called ^`exhausted'' deposits. This, of course, will require compressors. But without waiting for this, the wells must receive better attention.
Comrade Bagirov quite rightly raises the question of electric power in the oil fields. We are undoubtedly behindhand in the building of new power stations, but the fact that we are somewhat below the mark in output is due not only to this, and not only to the collapse of the drilling plan in 1938, but also to relaxed attention to the oil wells.
We have many splendid and outstanding people in glorious Bolshevik Baku, men like Ramazanov and women like Sugra Gaibova, who have obtained excellent results precisely by improving the technological regime of the wells and by reducing stoppages and breakdowns.
There are quite a number of fine oil fields, real models, where oulput is rising, when it is falling in other oil fields. Why, I a'sk, do some show a rise, and others a fall? Why do ``gales'' affect some, and not others?
It all depends on people and giving greater attention to the wells. This especially applies to Grozny, where the work is worse than anywhere else. We hope that the oil industry in general, and Baku as the foremost oil centre, will do its duty and attain a higher level.
In the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses, the oil refining industry has increased output by 50 per cent. A number of the refineries are operating in exemplary style. Nevertheless, we need a bigger increase.
328By 1942, output of refined oil will have increased by more than 125 per cent as compared with the period of the-Second Five-Year Plan. The output of petrol, the most valuable oil product, will have increased by 180 per cent at the end of the Third Five-Year Plan. Demand will be satisfied to a far greater extent.
The output of light oils, especially of petrol, will markedly increase in the Volga region and in the Urals, in the Far Eastern Territory, as well as in the central regions of the European part of the Soviet Union.
It is planned to increase petrol output by developing combined processes not only in the new refineries, but also in the existing refineries, by reconstructing them and utilizing them to the full capacity.
The new refineries will principally be of 500,000 tons capacity. Their locations have not yet been finally settled, but the preliminary plan is to build them in Syzran, Buguruslan, Kazan, Kurgan, Chelyabinsk, Tuimaza, Perm, the Far Eastern Territory, Armavir, Andizhan, Krasnovodsk, possibly in Ryazan, and other places.
In addition, the refineries in Orsk, Ufa, Moscow and Saratov now under construction will be completed. The Ufa refinery, in particular, comrades, must be completed at all costs.
As regards petrol, we must increase its output by employing the method of combined cracking, which has been highly developed in America and which produces a high-grade petrol.
To meet the demand for motor fuel, we must develop the production of high-grade petrol to the utmost.
The erection of these new plants confronts the machine-building industry with the complex task of supplying them with machinery and equipment of good quality and in good time.
I will say a few words about the manufacture of liquid fuel from coal and shale. This is a question of great importance to our country, in view of its huge territory, and the Met that oil and oil products have to be carried from the south all over the country. Comrade Stalin is keenly interested in this question and has instructed us to expedite the erection of plants for the manufacture of artificial liquid fuel wherever coal exists for the purpose, as, for example, in Gheremkhovo and the Far East.
The fuel problem must be solved. The normal functioning of the economic life of the country depends on it. Of course, it is of the utmost importance to regulate consumption and to put a stop to wasteful and barbaric consumption of hard and liquid fuel. In this 329 we must have the assistance of the consumers themselves; and it is to their advantage from the point of view of business finance.
In spite of the difficulties confronting the coal and oil industries, we are convinced that, under the leadership of the Central Committee and of Comrade Stalin personally, we shall solve the fuel problem. The local Party organizations in the coal and oil regions must give us the utmost assistance, for the solution of the coal and oil problem is the concern of the whole country.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ The Railways Have Become One of the Foremost BranchesNow, comrades, allow me to dwell iii rather greater detail on the railways, it being a matter with which I have some connection. ( Laughter.)
As you remember, the question of the railways was put very acutely at the Seventeenth Party Congress.
Speaking of the backward state of the (railways, (Comrade Stalin said:
``... Transport is the weak spot which may act as a stumbling block, and is already acting as a stumbling bloc, to our whole economic life, and above all to our trade.''
The backward state of the railways was sharply emphasized in the speeches of Comrades Molotov, Kirov and Orjonikidze, and in the speech of Comrade Voroshilov in connection with the defence of the country.
The very fact that the question of the railways was raised with all the force of Stalinist self-criticism, and the tasks outlined in the report of the Central Committee, helped to mobilize the energies of the railwaymen, because between the word and deed of our Central Committee there is no divergence.
Comrade Voroshilov concluded his speech on the railways as follows:
"Now that Comrade Stalin has tackled the transport problem seriously, you may be sure, comrades, that things will begin to hum."
And so it was. Comrade Stalin tackled the problem and gave' the railways every care, attention and assistance, and a Stalinist victory on the railways was ensured. (Applause.)
It may be said without exaggeration that in the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Party Congresses the railways have traversed a glorious path of struggle and Stalinist victories.
330It should be said, in particular, that the reception given to railwaymen by Comrade Stalin and other members of the Political Bureau in the Kremlin has been of historical importance to the life of the railways.
I will not make so bold as to declare to the Eighteenth Congress that we have performed all the tasks assigned to us, particularly the task of getting the railways to run with the smoothness of clockwork. In this respect there still remains a large field of activity for the railwaymen. But, summing up the results, I am in a position to report to the Party Congress that the railways have performed the task assigned to them by the Party and Comrade iStalin with credit.
Average daily loadings increased from 51,200 cars in 1933 to 88,000 cars in 1938, or by over 70 per cent. In the same period freight traffic increased from 169,500,000,000 ton-kilometres to 369,400,000,000 ton-kilometres, or by nearly 120 per cent. The railways fulfilled their Five-Year Plan ahead of time.
The railways of the U.S.S.R. carried 80 per cent more coal in 1938 than in 1933, 130 per cent more metal, over 50 per cent more grain, over 30 per cent more butter, nearly 100 per cent more vegetable oil, 230 per cent more eggs and 40 per cent more textiles. These figures are indicative of the rising standard of living of the people. We are now in the main satisfying the requirements of the country's industry.
The railways achieved these results both by improving work itself, making better use of equipment, and by increasing the capacity of the railways, largely as a result of more efficient operation.
Thus, we find the following improvement in the indices of utilization of rolling stock in 1938 as compared with 1933:
a) The turnover time of freight cars has been reduced by Over two days;
b) The standing time of cars in classification yards was correspondingly reduced by 4.6 hours;
c) Standing time of cars during loading operations was reduced by 9.5 hours;
d) Effective speed increased by 5.3 kilometres per hour;
e) Running speed increased by 9.6 kilometres per hour;
f) The average daily run of a freight car increased by 40.8 kilometres;
g) The average daily run of a freight locomotive increased Jby 87.3 kilometres.
These figures are indicative of a considerable improvement in the 331 utilization of rolling stock. The effect of the socialist economic system, and of the unquestionable improvement in traffic organization and in discipline is that-"we-, in the U.S.S.R. make more efficient use of locomotives, cars and every kilometre of line than European countries, and even than the U.S.A.
However, while it cannot be said that our railways are working to the limit, it can be said that they are working under strain, and that therefore their equipment must undoubtedly be increased.
We have done a lot of construction work during these years. I will not enumerate all of it in detail, for that would take too much time. I will say, however, that we built over 5,000 kilometres of new railway line and over 8,000 kilometres of second tracks---including Karymskaya-Khabarovsk---reconstructed over 5,000 kilometres of old track, carried out capital and medium repairs on about 100,000 kilometres of track, built over 30 automatic and 22 non-automatic humps, installed the automatic block system on about 5,000 kilometres of line, and centralized over 10,000 switches. Over 6,000 new, high-power locomotives---FD,JS,SO and other types---have been built, as well as 186,000 cars, including 101,000 four-axle cars and over 5,000 passenger cars. All cars have been fitted with automatic brakes, and one-fourth of the cars with automatic coupling.
We have built 216 new car repair shops (which are real factories). We have reconstructed a number of sheds and repair shops, etc., etc.
Thus the railways have been technically re-equipped to a considerable extent.
We cannot, of course, say that we have done everything. A vast amount still has to be done with regard to the technical'equipment of every branch of the railway system.
The most serious and important thing is that we must reconstruct the existing permanent way.
Unfortunately, our permanent way is still largely laid with old and light rails. We have already laid new rails on 25,000 kilometres of way. This is a big achievement. But a vast amount still remains to be done. The freight density of our railways far exceeds that of the railways of Europe and America. Consequently our tracks must be strengthened, reconstructed and laid on a metalled roadbed.
The introduction of powerful locomotives necessitates the reconstruction of a number of bridges.
Ojir locomotive system needs reconstruction. There have been big achievements during the past two years both as regards the operation and equipment of our locomotive park.
332During this period we have introduced:
The FD locomotive---a new powerful type whose traction power is 17 to 20 per cent greater than the E type, and whose speed is 85 kilometres p.h., as compared with 65 kilometres p.h. of the E type.
The Joseph Stalin (JS) locomotive---a passenger type which can develop a speed of 130 to 140 k.p.h.
We have splendid condenser locomotives. This is a revolution not only in locomotive construction but in railway operation in general. The acute problem of water supply is greatly mitigated by the introduction of condenser locomotives. The distinguishing feature of this locomotive is that, on leaving the cylinder, the steam is not wasted but passes to the tender where it is converted back into water by a special apparatus. This locomotive can run a thousand kilometres or more without taking on water and effects a considerable reduction in fuel expenditure (about 20 per cent).
We are able to increase the power of all locomotives by means of a booster, or auxiliary engine. There are many stretches of line where a second locomotive has to be coupled to the train because the engine cannot make the haul. By installing a booster, the locomotive driver can switch on this auxiliary engine without any difficulty and can dispense with the second locomotive. This is of the highest importance.
We have introduced a number of improvements in our locomotives, and the result is an all-round saving.
Just as our line is to increase the power of locomotives, so we must increase to the utmost the proportion of four-axle cars, which are highly advantageous as regards both the carriage of goods and the carriage of passengers.
We all remember how our industry and our late Comrade Orjonikidze carried out the instructions of Comrade Stalin and supplied the railways with 80,000 cars. Unfortunately, today the plan of car supply is not being fulfilled, in spite of the fact that we now have the huge Urals Car Works.
We must expand the production of flat cars, gondola cars and hopper cars. The wreckers spoilt the hopper car. Its design must be corrected, but hopper cars must be manufactured. We must build refrigerator cars for the carriage of foodstuffs, the quantity of which is steadily increasing (butter, milk, fish and meat). We must increase the production of tank cars, because the amount of liquid fuel carried 333 today is not what it was in 1932 and 1933, when there were fewer machine and tractor stations.'
It goes without saying that we must continue equipping cars with automatic couplings, as the decision of the Seventeenth Party Congress has not yet been fully carried out. In the period of the Third Five-Year Plan, no less than 300,000 freight cars must be equipped with automatic couplings, and no less than 200,000 with automatic brakes.
. As regards the traffic capacity of our railways, which has grown considerably, it must be said that we have to build new lines. We have built quite a number of new lines, but not enough. We are starting construction on the Baikal-Amur trunk line, We are building a railway from Kartaly to Akmolinsk for the transportation of coal from Karaganda. This is part of the grand Stalinsk-Magnitogorsk trunk line from Magnitogorsk to Taishet through the Kuznetsk Basin.
Generally speaking, our comrades in Kazakhstan cannot complain about railway construction; quite a number have been built in their republic. The Kartaly-Akmolinsk railway will facilitate traffic from the Kuznetsk Basin to the Urals. We carry freight to the Far East, and we carry freight from the Kuznetsk Basin to the Urals, and from the Urals to the Kuznetsk Basin, which puts a big strain on this section. Difficulties are also created by the insufficient carrying capacity of the line from the South to the East, through Balashov, Penza and Valuiki. We must build a railway from Kizlyar to Astrakhan. This will divert the carriage of North Caucasian and Baku oil away from Balashov and shorten the haul to the East. A big task faces us in increasing the traffic capacity of our railways for defence purposes.
We must build second tracks, for we have a fairly large number of single-track lines. It is particularly important to build a second track from Omsk to Moscow through Sverdlovsk. We are experiencing great difficulties in the carriage of timber, which is transported from the Urals, from Archangel and from Siberia. We are beginning to lay second tracks in the Urals and on the Archangel line. This will considerably facilitate the transportation of timber.
The problem of station facilities has become very acute. The traffic capacity of a section (from station to station) frequently exceeds the amount of freight the station can handle. Trains used to consist of 50 cars; now they consist of 85 cars, or as many as 100 empties. The result is that on arrival a train has to be split into two parts. To avoid this, station sidings must be lengthened.
334Hence the necessity of reconstructing the stations so as to increase their freight-handling capacity.
Marked disproportions in traffic capacities have in the process of time arisen on the railways owing to uneven reconstruction of the basic branches. For example, the traffic capacity of line sections may exceed the capacity of stations, locomotive yards or water towers.
Such disproportion will affect any industry, but far more the railways. The slightest delay in traffic on one railway, or even at one station, immediately affects all railways.
Hence the necessity of drawing up a uniform technical plan of reconstruction to eliminate the disproportions mentioned and thus increase the traffic capacity of the railways.
An important part in increasing traffic capacity will be played by the reconstruction of the signal system and switch system.
There are a large number of switches on the railways. We can and undoubtedly should introduce switch interlocking systems, both electrical and mechanical. This will not only result in economy, but also in traffic safety. The switchman will become a mechanic.
Under the train-order and telegraphic system, a train cannot leave a station until the train that is scheduled to run ahead of it has arrived. This is a fairly antiquated system of communication. Yet the train-order system is fairly widespread on our railways.
The most highly perfected signalling method is the automatic block system, or in some cases the semi-automatic block system.
Parallel with this, we must introduce such splendid technical innovations as the interlocking tower and the automatic stop system.
The interlocking tower makes it possible for train traffic to be regulated for dozens of miles around by one man from one centre. The effect as regards traffic capacity and'traffic speed is no less than in the case of the automatic block system. The economy in personnel at junctions and small stations is/eight men per stopping place.
In order to reduce accidents, wider use must be made of the automatic stop system, which automatically puts the brake on a train if it runs past a closed signal or if there is some obstacle on the line.
We must introduce all these innovations on our railways on the widest possible scale.
As regards national defence, quite a lot has been done on the railways. But a lot more still remains to be done in the way of various 335 construction work, for national defence purposes. We hope to cope with this task successfully. During the period under review our railways have shown that they are able to 'meet our country's transport requirements. In the main, with few exceptions---timber, for example---we are satisfying the country's needs.
Let me assure the Congress that when the need arises we shall also cope with military requirements. The railways will not be an obstacle. In case of necessity we shall supply all the requirements of the Red Army and transport everything promptly, so that what we dispatch to the army, it may re-dispatch from its guns and aeroplanes to the enemy wherever it may be necessary to destroy him. (Loud applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Measures for the Further Improvement of the RailwaysThe People's Commissariat of the Railways is faced with the big task of improving passenger service. Passenger traffic has increased. Whereas 927,000,000 passengers were carried in 1933, 1,177,500,000 passengers were carried in 1938. The prompt running of suburban trains has become an acute question. I must tell the Congress that the People's Commissariat of Railways has adopted a number of measures, both administrative and organizational, to ensure a marked reduction in suburban train delays.
We envisage an increase of passenger traffic from 1,142,700,000 persons in 1937 to 1,463,000,000 persons in 1942. The main thing is to improve the service given to passengers and to eliminate train delays. This, in its turn, depends upon the traffic capacity of the railways, for we are operating without reserves, and the slightest defect results in delay.
The People's Commissariat of Railways and the People's Commissariat of the Machine-Building Industry are planning a new type of passenger car. The passenger cars that are built in the U.S.S.R. at present are 20.2 metres long and have a wooden body. They do not meet requirements either as to safety or as to the growing demands of the Soviet passenger. The People's Commissariat of Railways and the People's Commissariat of the Machine-Building Industry have worked out preliminary designs for a new type of all-metal passenger car 25 metres long. This car will ensure greater safety, provide maximum comfort for the passenger and will come up to modern hygienic requirements (they are more impermeable to dust). The present system of ventilation by means of a natural draught will 336 be replaced by a perfected 'system which will ensure a sufficient supply of purified, circulating and conditioned air. The cars will be centrally heated from the locomotive, with facilities, in some cases, for heating each individual car. The passenger and crew accommodations will have improved fittings and a better finish. Our task is to inculcate real socialist culture in passenger traffic.
Our Moscow Metro may serve as a model of cultured passenger service. And it must be admitted that the passengers on the Metro themselves set an example of a cultured attitude towards means of transportation.
It need hardly be said that we railwaymen do not in any way mean to imply by this construction program that we have no reserves for further improvement. That would be untrue. Of course, we have exhausted a considerable part of our reserves; but we still have some, as for example, in the assembling of trains, in the spread of the Stakhanov-Krivonos methods, in reducing standing time, in the consigning of goods by clients in whole trainloads, in the ring system (by which a driver makes several runs without taking his locomotive into the depot), in increasing the length of run of a locomotive in between washings, in reducing the number of accidents and breakdowns, in improved care of tracks, locomotives, cars and other equipment, and so on.
The way trains are assembled is of great importance to the speed of traffic. A reduction in the standing time of cars at freight yards by one hour would increase total loadings by more than 5,000 cars per day.
One big reserve is the better arrangement of the traffic schedule. The railways have succeeded in reducing the number of accidents and breakdowns. In spite of the increase in freight traffic, in 1938 there were less than half the accidents there were in 1934. Nevertheless, the number of accidents and breakdowns is still high. Further reduction in this respect will mean a great improvement in the work of the railways.
There are still unutilized potentialities for improving the work of the railways in respect to locomotives. During the past two years the proportion of FD and SO locomotives has increased, yet the weight of trains has risen by only 8 per cent and running speed by only 7 per cent. The development of the ring system, the increase in the weight of trains, the use of .replaceable parts for repair purposes, the installation of booster engines on locomotives, the preliminary heating of water in the tender, the use of coal dust as fuel---this and other __PRINTERS_P_337_COMMENT__ 22---263 337 measures offer powerful potentialities for a further improvement of the work of the railways.
Proper utilization of loading and unloading machinery, the utmost development of Blidman methods in loading, of Kozhukhar and Krasnov methods in traffic regulation, and of Krivonos methods in train driving all constitute tremendous potentialities for the improvement of the work of the railways.
A powerful factor in railway operation was the enlistment of the efforts of the workers, improved selection of personnel, and more efficient administration.
There is one more potentiality, a big one, one to which Comrade Stalin has drawn attention. That is the regulation of freight carriage, the elimination of irrational cross-hauls and long-distance 'hauls. This depends both on the railways themselves and on their clients.
JF'or some'reason it has been the custom hitherto to assume that the railways are obliged to carry whatever freight is offered to them. The railways themselves, of course, could help to regulate the planning of freight carriage; they could complain and demand the removal of anomalies by clients. Unfortunately, this has been done all too little.
As a result, we have outrageous instances of irrational consignments of goods. Here are a few examples.
Thirteen carloads of round timber were consigned from the Eastern Siberian Railway to the October (Railway, when the October Railway itself was carrying round timber eastward.
The Southern Railway dispatched several carloads of timber to the Gorky Railway, when the Gorky Railway carries timber for the South.
Twenty carloads of wood fuel were consigned from Kuibyshev to Orsk, tat the same time that the Bashkir Oil Trust consigned twenty carloads of wood fuel in the opposite direction from Tavtimanovo to Kuibyshev.
Things have reached such a pass that the freight departments of the railways accept without demur such absurd shipments as pickled cabbage from the Odessa Railway for the East; cranberries Mnd common wood furniture from the October Railway for the East, a distance of several thousand kilometres; hay from the Kuibyshev Railway for the East; crushed chalk from the Dzerzhinsky Railway for the East; straw from the Lenin and Gorky Railways for the Odessa Railway; sugar from the Orjonikidze Railway for the South-Western Railway.
338Endless examples of such irrational consignments could be cited.
We must put a stop to this.
By proper planning and proper carrying out of the plan, we must develop the productive forces of the country and distribute them properly, and thus reduce the quantity and improve the quality of freight carried.
The railways can and should help the Central Committee and the government in preventing anomalies in the distribution of the productive forces of the country.
Comrade Stalin has put the question of the proper distribution of industry very emphatically. At the Sixteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B) he raised the question of the proper distribution of the productive forces of the U.S.S.R., and, first and foremost, of its industry, as one tof the most important tasks of socialist construction.
It should be said that quite a lot has been done in the way of carrying out Comrade Stalin's instructions.
As a result of the Stalinist Five-Year Plans, instead of one large coalfield---the Donetz Basin---we ndw have several. These include the new coalfields of Kuznetsk, the Urals, Karaganda, the Moscow Region, the Far East and Central Asia.
Parallel with the tremendous increase of coal output in the old fields, there has been a fairly rapid increase in the output of the new coalfields, and its proportion to the total output of the U.S.S.R. had grown considerably by the end of the period of the Second Five-Year Plan.
The relative impor.tance of the various iron and steel areas is also entirely different from what it was in old capitalist Russia, when the iron and steel industry was distributed in the most irrational way.
The proportion of rolled steel produced by the Southern plants to the total output of the country declined 'from 64.1 per cent in 1932 to 56.0 per cent in 1937, while the proportion of the output of the Eastern plants correspondingly rose from 16.8 per cent to 23.3 per cent. The industries of the national republics have developed considerably during the past ten years.
Nevertheless, it must be said that the problem of the proper distribution of productive forces is still as acute as ever, for the development of a number of branches and regions is still backward. This is particularly felt on the railways.
I need only mention that today coal from the Donetz Basin is carried as far as Archangel and Ufa; metal from the South is carried to Vladivostok; Siberian metal is carried to Vladivostok, Ashkhabad, 339 Leningrad and Kiev; Ukrainian sugar is carried eight or nine thousand kilometres, all the way to the Far East; Ivanovo and Moscow textiles are carried thousands of kilometres, and so on. Assembled machines are carried seven or eight thousand kilometres. Cement is carried from the South, from Novorossisk and Amvrosievka, to the Far East, a distance of 8,500 and 9,000 kilometres. A striking case in which interests of the railways have been ignored is the specialization of rolling mills introduced by the wreckers in the iron and steel industry.
It is clear that we are making poor use of the potentialities of the planned socialist economic system. Under the bourgeois economic system industrial centres spring up chaotically; in our country they grow up in accordance with plan, and we are able to direct our development by plan. Consequently, there must be a serious improvement in this respect. This has been pointed out by Comrade Stalin. The geological resources of our country enable us to bring industry into close proximity to the sources of raw material and the centres .of demand in the most effective way. Considerable assistance in this respect is being given by our numerous body of devoted geologists.
Coal is literally to be found all over the country, from the Moscow Region to Vladivostok. There is iron ore in the Centre, the South, in the Urals, in Siberia, in the Far East and in the North-West. But not everywhere is it being exploited.
Lastly, even where there is no iron, it is more advantageous to build small rolling mills and to carry pig iron, than to carry rolled metal.
The production of oil and gas must be developed wherever they are to be found. In particular, pipe lines should be laid for the distribution of oil and gas. That is far more profitable than carrying them by rail.
Textile mills should be built in the cotton-growing regions, and cotton growing developed in the southern regions of our country, for example, in the Ukraine, the Caucasus and the North Caucasus. Sugar refineries should be built where the sugar-beet is grown; in particular, we must extend the cultivation of sugar-beet and build new refineries in the Far Eastern Territory, along the TurkestanSiberian Railway and along the Tomsk Railway. The cement industry should be developed in the Far East, the Urals and Siberia. The geological deposits of raw material are very large.
Lastly, industries of a local character must be developed everywhere, in particular, the manufacture of furniture, footwear and 340 confectionery, garment making, and so on, not to mention vegetables and similar produce.
This is no easy task. In addition to building new plants in new spots, the old plants must be relocated. This requires very careful thought.
If w*e set about it in earnest, the problem can be solved, step by step.
The People's Commissariat of Railways can play an important part in this and must tackle the job in a Bolshevik way.
Big tasks undoubtedly face the railwaymen. They must consolidate the achievements already won and spread the new socialist culture---smooth operation---on the railways, so as to be able to give efficient service to the growing industry of the country and punctually to satisfy the freight requirements of their clients, and especially tOiextend efficient service to the passengers, the citizens of our socialist country.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Railwaymen's Rising Standard of Living. Political Work onThe standard of living of the railwaymen has risen in the interval between the Seventeenth and the Eighteenth Congresses.
The total railway payroll rose from 3,100,000,000 rubles in 1933 to 9,100,000,000 in 1938, a three-fold increase/The average wage was 131 rubles in 1933 and 287.9 rubles in 1938. A freight locomotive driver earned 846 rubles per month in 1938, as compared with 328 rubles in 1933, an increase of 157 per cent. A passenger locomotive driver earned 1,042 rubles in 1938, as compared with 398 rubles in 1933.
In the period 1934 to 1938, houses with a total of 2,400,000 sq. metres of dwelling space were built for railwaymen. Nevertheless, it must be said that the housing shortage is still acute on the railways and housing construction must be developed.
In (the last three years alone 318 new schools were built for railwaymen's children. Today there are in all 2,595 schools accommodating 1,130,000 railwaymen's .children.
In the period 1934 to 1938 the railways built 62 hospitals, 130 polyclinics and dispensaries, 620 maternity homes, 143 mother and child consultation centres, 310 creches and 71 children's sanatoria.
The railways have over 6,000 Red corners (club rooms), 700 club 341 premises and 134 club cars. In these cultural centres there are over 8,000 art and dramatic circles in which over 200,000 railwaymen and members of their families take part.
The rise in the standard of living has been accompanied by a rise in political activity.
The Stakhanov-Krivonos movement on the railways has been marked by the introduction of a large number of progressive innovations in methods of work which open up immense possibilities .for increasing productivity of labour.
The Party organizations have been the leaders of socialist competition. The Stakhanov movement on the railways has become a real mass movement, and today, at the time of the Eighteenth Party Congress, their army of Stakhanovites consists of 566,719 persons. The campaign for the fulfilment of the decision of the Council of People's Commissars, the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and the AllUnion Central Trade Union Council of December 28, 1938, has yielded good results, and labour discipline on the railways is improving from month to month. The largest decrease in infractions of discipline on the majority of the railways was among the locomotive drivers, which is the leading profession.
The questions of mass political work arising out of this decision of the Party and the Government are important ones in all branches of the national economy, in all branches of industry. The political departments on the railways started a campaign to explain to railwaymen and their families the meaning of the decision of the Council of People's Commissars, the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and the A.U.C.T.U.C. on the subject of firmer labour discipline. All forms of mass propaganda were employed: readings, talks, meetings of workers, discussions, radio, the press, illustrated lectures, and visits to railwaymen's homes.
Railwaymen's wives are taking an active part in the fight for the improvement of the railways. A total of over 250,000 women on all the railways are taking part in the movement of women activists. A splendid movement has been started among railwaywomen to learn the art of locomotive driving.
In order to help women to acquire the mass professions, a large number of courses have been started on the railways. These courses are attended by 16,000 women, including 5,000 women who are studying the locomotive and are preparing in the near future to become locomotive drivers' assistants, and subsequently drivers. It is a fact without parallel in the world that there are already 18 women 342 locomotive drivers and 310 drivers' assistants on the Soviet railways, all of whom are coping with their duties splendidly.
On January 1, 1939, there were 165,511 Communists on the railways, of whom 115,346 were members and 50,165 candidate members of theC.P.S.U.(B.).
On January 1, 1934, there were 115,453 members of the Young Communist League on the railways; on January 1, 1939, there were 337,889 Y.C.L. members, or more than twice as many. The members of the Leninist-Stalinist Young Communist League on the railways have grown into a huge army. The task set by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) of taking on 20,000 Y.C.L. members on the railways has been fulfilled. In the past two years over 22,000 Y.C.L. members have been admitted into the C.P.S.U. (B.) as candidate members, and over 1,500 Y.C.L. members who were candidate members of the C.P.S.U. (B.) have been made'full-fledged members.
An interesting feature is the increase in recent years in the number of Communists with university and secondary education.
Thus, while on January 1, 1936, there were 8,990 Communists with a university education, on January 1, 1939, there were 13,064.
In accordance with the decision of the February-March Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), 478 junction Party committees were set up. They embrace over 60 per cent of the primary Party organizations on the railways.
The political departments on the railways and the junction Party committees have focused their attention, on Party political work, on the political study of cadres, and on the work of studying that splendid Stalinist work, the History of the C.P.S.U. (B.). The political departments on all the railways have formed groups of lecturers who periodically visit junctions and stations to lecture on the history of the C.P.S.U. (B) and to help railwayman in the independent study of the History of the C.P.S'.U.(B.)---Short Course. About 7,000 lectures, attended by over one million railwaymen, were delivered in January and February 1939 alone.
Comrade Stalin's slogan of mastering Bolshevism and combining political and economic work must continue to serve as a program of action for the Party organizations on the railways.
However, although the Party organizations have improved their work and have become steeled and tempered in the fight against winter difficulties, their work, like the work of the leading executives and the personnel of the political departments, suffers from a number of serious defects both as regards mass work, the ideological 343 educalion of Communists, and as regards organizational work. Self-criticism and vigilance must therefore form the 'basis of all further improvement in political Work on the railways. By relying in their work on the help of the local Party organizations, the railway Party organizations have eliminated the gap, the "right of way," between the local and the railway organizations.
While at the time of the Seventeenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.) there were many Communists who were not fulfilling their work standards and were producing damaged goods, the present stage is marked by a considerable enhancement of the vanguard role of Communists in production.
The Communists on the railways have become active fighters in the struggle to improve the railway service. Communists are leading the Stakhanov-Krivonos movement on the railways. The vast majority of the hundreds of innovators of socialist methods of labour, whose names are known to the whole country, are Communists and Y.C.L. members.
The Party organizations on the railways have done highly valuable work in assisting railwayimen to master the new technique, in spreading Stakhanov-Krivonos methods of work, in the study of the rules of technical operation, and in assisting the backward. New forms of socialist competition have arisen and have played a big part in the improvement of railway operation (driving heavy trains, the ring system, repair of cars without uncoupling, competition among the train crew on one trip, issue of repair guarantee certificates, introduction of station and repair shop labels, issue of certificates of fitness for winter operation). The initiators of these methods were as a rule Communists and Y.C.L. members. Today, at the time of the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.), the Communists on the railways represent a close-knit and monolithic detachment of our Party.
The initiative of the Donetz railwaymen in organizing pre-Congress competition was taken up by the railwaymen all over the Soviet Union. The result of this pre-Congress competition was that in February, after -some brief difficulties, the state loading and unloading plan was fulfilled.
The territorial committees and regional committees of the Party are now giving serious attention to the work of the railways and are helping the railwaymen. At the same time, the political departments have the cooperation of the trade unions. It must be said that the railwaymen's unions are helping greatly with their mass political 344 work. I want to stress the fact that the leading personnel on the railways, from superintendents of lines downwards, are taking an active part in political life and Party work. There is no doubt that the sense of Party-political honour among the railway executives is now highly developed. The railwaymen have been too long in bad odour for their poor work, and now that they have gained recognition, and the honour of the service is the concern of every railwayman, right down to the switchman, naturally the executives are anxious not to lose it. They have won this honour by hard effort, and they will never surrender it. (Applause.)
I must tell you that when difficulties arise, especially under winter conditions, concern is aroused in everybody, from the switchmen, locomotive drivers and conductors to the highest personnel and their wives and children. There are still individuals who show indifference and dislike for their jobs; there are still individuals who are inefficient, have not learned how to work, but who conceitedly imagine that they have already reached the acme of proficiency. But the overwhelming bulk of the railwaymen have been raised by the Party and its Central Committee to a high political level, and they are fighting like Bolsheviks for the honour of the Soviet railways, for the honour of working on the railways, the honour of which Comrade iStalin has spoken.
The cultural and political aspect of the railwayman has changed. He is no longer the sullen and unsociable individual he once was; he is now energetic, cheerful and confident in his future. He is a real warrior---a builder of socialism. What greatly contributes to this is the All-Union Railwaymen's Day established in commemoration of the reception given to the railwaymen by Comrade Stalin. This day has become a real holiday in the life of the railwaymen. It is with good reason that the railwaymen call it the Stalinist Railwaymen's Day.
. New people have come to the fore on our railways. And it is not surprising that we have hundreds of thousands of what I may call progressive people, men and women, among the locomotive drivers and other professions. What our locomotive drivers are most proud of---and they are always saying so---is that they are members of the same profession as Comrade Stalin. They drive the locomotive of the railways, while Comrade Stalin drives the locomotive of the revolution. (Prolonged applause.) They declare: "We must work and *fight as Comrade Stalin teaches us, and as Comrade Stalin works and fights.''
345 __ALPHA_LVL2__ Checking Fulfilment and Selection of CadresAt the Seventeenth Party Congress Comrade Stalin quoted Lenin's brilliant thought that "the chief thing in organizational work is the selection of people and keeping a check on the way decisions are fulfilled." Comrade Stalin teaches us that proper leadership means:
``Firstly, finding the proper solution to a problem; but it is impossible to find the proper solution to a problem without taking into account the experience of the masses who feel the results of our leadership on their own backs;
``Secondly, organizing the application of the correct solution, which, however, cannot be done without the direct assistance of the masses;
``Thirdly, organizing a check-up on the fulfilment of this solution, which again cannot be done without the direct assistance of the masses." (Reply to the (Discussion at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. [B.], March 1&37.)
A decision should be arrived at after consultation with the masses, and with the help of the masses. That is the way the Party Central Committee adopted a number of decisions during the period under review, decisions of a political and organizational character---on the Constitution, the Rules of the Agricultural Artel, the elections, improvement of Party work. The Central Committee called in people from') the localities, discussed these questions with them, listened to their advice, and then adopted its decisions. Thus the first rule of Bolshevik style which business leaders should observe is to take account of the experience of the masses and to invite their assistance.
The second rule is the organization of a real Bolshevik check-up on the way decisions are fulfilled. It should be said that with regard to keeping a check-up on fulfilment there are many defects. True, orders are issued in abundance. After all, it is easier to issue an order than to keep a painstaking check-up on the way it is fulfilled. I think one advantage of keeping a check-up on fulfilment is that less orders would be issued and a better check-up kept and test made of people.
Keeping a check-up on fulfilment is inseparable from Bolshevik revolutionary vigilance. It enables one to ascertain how people do their jobs. Vigilance means observing the way a man w|orks---whether with zeal or without zeal, whether with ardour or without ardour, whether with a will or without a will, whether with real concern for his job or with just a perfunctory interest in it. We often meet people who do their work perfunctorily, go in for red tape so as to insure 346 themselves, so as to have a document ready for any emergency, but who have no real concern for their job and are not troubled by difficulties that arise. Thus, by keeping a check-up on fulfilment we can get to know people.
When it comes to the question of vigilance, it must.be said that, as Comrade Stalin has put it and as Comrade Mikoyan put it here yesterday, vigilance is impossible without a check-up on fulfilment of decisions.
Further, Bolshevik style in the work of business leaders consists in an ability to combine business matters with the general policy of the Party, with the specific practical matters that ensure the carrying out of the Party line.
Here, too, an example is set us by the Central Committee of our Party and by our great Stalin. If our business executives were to study the work of the Central Committee of our Party they would learn a lot about the way to settle questions.
When settling any question, the Central Committee never confines itself to giving general'indications. Whether it is an economic question; or a question of foreign policy, or a question relating to the defence of our country, the Central Committee and Comrade Stalin always give, in addition to a clear general political line, specific instructions of the utmost concreteness; and this is always combined with a check-up on the way the instructions are fulfilled. I think that many of our people have no idea how concretely, for example, Comrade Stalin goes into all matters relating to the strengthening of our defences, the mobilization of our industry, especially the defence industry, for the production of all forms of modern armament, and the mastery of the use of this armament by our Red Army, from artillery and tanks to aircraft.
The secretaries of many regional Party committees and territorial Party committees where there are munitions factories know and are aware of the day-to-day recommendations given by Comrade Stalin on questions of defence, just as do our military comrades who carry out the day-to-day recommendations of Comrade Stalin.
We executives, if we want to be successful in future, must reconstruct our work. Much has already been done in the way of reconstructing leadership: People's Commissariats have been divided up, csllegiums have been set up within People's Commissariats, and a number of new Central Administrations and trusts have been created. This is a big and valuable reform. It has helped to strengthen OUT state and our might.
347The whole work of the Party was bound up with the eradication of wreckers and the promotion of millions of new people.
In 1937 and 1938, the leading personnel of heavy industry, especially the fuel industry, and of the railways were thoroughly renovated and new people were promoted in place of the exposed wreckers. Thousands of new people were promoted to executive posts.
The majority of these new executives are engineers and technicians. For example, 114 leading executives in the coal trusts, qr 63 per cent of the total, are people with a higher education (engineers).
But these young forces must master the art of organization, especially in view of the need for new norms (arrangement of work place, etc.) and discard one-sidedness; that is, engineers must abandon a narrow engineer's approach and organizers a narrow organizational approach.
They must, like Bolsheviks, combine organizational, administrative work with mass explanatory work (especially in respect to preventing wilful absences from work). The new forces must study, master Bolshevism, and learn the art of management.
In heavy industry and on the railways, as everywhere else, a new technical and industrial intelligentsia has arisen. Of a total number of 70,000 specialists with a higher education in the industries that used to be under the former People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry, the majority (51,800, or 76.1 per cent) are people under forty. The majority of the technical and industrial intelligentsia in heavy industry graduated from university in the period of the First and Second Five-Year Plans. Of them, 80.3 per cent (54,720) graduated in the period 1929-38, 85.9 per cent (10,447) in the People's Commissariat of the Fuel Industry. In our technical intelligentsia in heavy industry we find a reflection of the Party's policy of creating and training cadres among the non-Russian nationalities of the Soviet Union.
The number of women experts in heavy industry is 13,000 or 19.1 per cent of the total number of experts; 8,600 of them are engineers, representing 15.4 per cent of the total. Among the chemical engineers 36.7 per cent are women, among the geologists 21.2 per cent, among the non-ferrous metallurgical engineers 20 per cent, and among the architects 18.9 per cent.
The majority of these people come from the ranks of the working class.
As you see, comrades, new people have come to replace those of the old personnel who simply proved unadapted for leadership of the working class in the new period, when it has grown politically 348 and culturally---for leadership of production in the conditions created by the Stakhanov movement. Some of them, even honest people, were under the sway of the business executives who had become entangled in wrecking activities, and adopted their habits and customs. The Trotsky-Pyatakov-Zinoviev-Bukharin bandits managed to enlist part of the business executives in espionage activities.
The Party, the state and our socialist industry have got rid of them. In some branches it was found necessary to remove several layers. We have seen how, relying upon its foremost people, on its new cadres, the railway system---that most complex machine which should run with the precision of clockwork----has begun to function more effectively and efficiently.
We now have cadres who will perform any task assigned to them by the Party, the Central Committee and the Soviet Government, any task assigned to them by Comrade Stalin.
We must now see to it that these new cadres master Bolshevism.
In the selection of cadres, the Central Committee of our Party has unswervingly adhered to the line indicated by Comrade Stalin. The new people were selected with an eye to business and political ability combined. This should be a highly important rule of the Bolshevik style of business leadership, namely, to select forces in a Bolshevik way, with an eye both to business abilities and political qualifications.
Stalinist policy and practice in the selection of cadres have only the interests of the Party and the state in mind. That is the cornerstone of the whole work of our Party Central Committee. The interests of the state---the selection of people, combined with the eradication of enemies and the promotion of new people---was the chief and deciding factor in the selection of cadres. In our work of selecting cadres we must continue to combine the business principle with the political principle. If you want to be a real Bolshevik leader you must master Bolshevism. When the vile activities of the enemies were exposed, Comrade Stalin issued the slogan that our'Soviet cadres must master Bolshevism. This meant that it was not enough to master technology, it was not enough to become an engineer or an economist; you had to be a politically trained person, so that your engineering skill should not be wasted, so that the enemy should not wind you round his little finger, so that he might not spoil your work; on the contrary, that you might be able to detect him and expose him promptly.'
Mastering Bolshevism does not just mean being a politically educated person. The adversary may also be an educated person. Consequently, what is meant here is a profound comprehension of 349 political processes, an ability to sense under-surface sentiments, a comprehension of the laws of the class struggle, an understanding of our new tasks, which demand an ability to overcome the difficulties that bar our way, and always to be a staunch, self-confident, eager and energetic Bolshevik.
From this point of view, the work done during the past two years by our Party, under the direct leadership of Comrade Stalin, to improve Party work, to improve propaganda and the press, and especially the publication of the splendid textbook on the history of the Party, has been truly immense.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Comrade Stalin's Report is a Great Fighting ProgramThe new theoretical problems dealt with by Comrade Stalin in his report at the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.) should play, and will play, a tremendous part in the education of the millions of our people, and in particular the hundreds of thousands of business executives.
The theory of the state expounded by Comrade Stalin at this Congress is of the utmost importance. It must be frankly stated that many understood the classless, socialist society to mean that all danger had already passed and that therefore the question of vigilance was no longer an acute one. Even after the villainous assassination of Comrade Kirov, and after the circular letter of the Central Committee of the Party had issued a warning against lack of vigilance, this lack of vigilance continued. The reason for this undoubtedly lies in a failure to understand the new stage of socialism through which the country is passing, a failure to understand the danger to the socialist country arising from the capitalist encirclement, and the role of the state in combating this danger.
Comrade Stalin's formulation of the question of a proletarian state Surrounded by a capitalist world, when socialism has been victorious in only one country, raises the theory of- the proletarian state to a new level.
It is now clear that, having entered the period of transition from socialism to the higher phase of communism, we need a strong Soviet state, we need a strong and gallant Soviet intelligence service, we need a strong and gallant Red Army, we need to continue to 350 strengthen the economic, political and defensive might of our Soviet Union. I think, comrades, that the report of the Central Committee has shown that our minds may be at ease about our state---it is in the reliable hands of Comrade Stalin. (Loud applause.)
Comrades, in the interval between the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Party Congresses we built socialism in the main in the course of a struggle against the remnants of the capitalist classes. In the interval between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses, multiplying the victories of socialism in the economic and cultural fields, we strengthened the political might of socialism and---most important of all--- protected it, defended it from the assaults of the capitalist enemy acting through his agents, the Trotsky-Bukharin spies and diversionists.
In the period under review, the period between the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses, by smashing the spies and diversionists, our Party, under the new conditions, dealt the first crushing blow to the capitalist encirclement.
If the Seventeenth Party Congress was called the Congress of Victors, the Eighteenth Party Congress may doubly be called a Congress of Victors.
The Party comes to this Congress after its policy has undergone a supreme test by the people, by the millions. This test was the elections to the Supreme Soviet on the basis of the new Stalin Constitution. The victories of socialism have been vividly reflected in the Stalin Constitution and in the solid unity of our people in the elections.
In the elections to the Supreme Soviets the working class, and the people generally, took part, as it were, in the discussion of the report of the Central Committee of our Party. The nations of the great Soviet Union value.and love their Party as never before---the Party which, having begun as a small illegal handful of stalwart revolutionaries, organized by Lenin and Stalin, roused the great and mighty strength of the people to perform miracles and to build the new, communist life.
At this Congress, Comrade Stalin has given us a new program for a whole historical period---for ten or fifteen years. This is truly a great program of great Bolshevik deeds.
*The Eighteenth Congress of the Bolshevik Party, having heard the report of the Central Committee, will undoubtedly approve of the activities of its Central Committee. Comrade Stalin's report will become a great program of great deeds of our glorious Party in the new 351 historical period of transition from socialism to the higher phase of communism. (Loud and prolonged applause.)
Our task is to carry out this program.
The Party of Lenin and Stalin, a Party which has traversed the great path of struggle against the oppressors of the working people; a party which has defeated the traitors within the working class, and has destroyed the tsarist system and the capitalist class; a party which, in October 1917, implanted the Red Banner of Socialism on one-sixth of the surface of the earth; a party which won the great victories of the Civil War, fighting the Whiteguard (generals and fourteen interventionist states; a party which abolished the kulak class, eliminated the capitalist elements and destroyed the viper's nests of spies and diversionists; a party which has built socialism---such a party will fulfil with credit this new and great program of great works for the building of communism in our country. (Loud applause.)
The Bolsheviks have shown that they are capable of performing tasks of a magnitude unparalleled in the history of mankind. The whole world will be convinced of this once more when, at our next congress, we sum up the results obtained in realizing the great Stalin program adopted by the Eighteenth Congress. The guarantee of this is the mighty Stalinist leadership of the Central Committee of our Party, and the leadership of Comrade Stalin. (All rise. Loud and prolonged applause and cheers in honour of Comrade Stalin.)
Long live the Eighteenth Congress of our Party!
Long live our glorious and mighty Bolshevik Party---the decisive force in the building of the comimunist society!
Long live the author of the program of struggle for communism and the great leader of the work of realizing this program, our dear and beloved Comrade Stalin! (All rise. Loud and prolonged applause and cheers in honour of Comrade Stalin. Cries of "Hurrah for our great Stalin!")
352
__ALPHA_LVL1__
M. KALININ
Comrades, revolutionary Marxists have always been whole-hearted and consistent supporters of the state as the mainspring in the reorganization of society on communist principles. Lenin and Stalin always maintained that this was the function and significance of the state, and stoutly defended their view against all the enemies of Marxism, from the anarchists down to the Bukharinite hirelings of fascism.
From the very commencement of its revolutionary activity, our Party has been schooling the working class to fight for power, impressing upon the workers that they must create their own state in order to suppress and destroy the exploiting classes, in order to build communism.
You no doubt remember the historic episode at the First AilRussian Congress of Soviets in June 1917. Tsereteli, the well-known Menshevik leader, was making a report on the general policy of the Provisional Government and declared "There is no political party in Russia which would say: Hand over the power to us, quit, we will take your place. There is no such party in Russia." To this, as you know, Lenin made reply from the body of the hall with his thrilling interjection: "There is!''
With this interjection Lenin demonstrated clearly enough the attitude of the Communist Party to state authority, to the state.
History has wholly vindicated and confirmed the standpoint of Lenin, the standpoint of the Bolsheviks.
Comrade Stalin in his theoretical works has further developed the Marxist-Leninist analysis of the question of the state. Comrade Stalin's report on the work of the Central Committee of the __PRINTERS_P_353_COMMENT__ 23-263 353 C.P.S.U. (B.) at the present congress is a new contribution to the Marxist-Leninist doctrine of the state.
I shall leave the theoretical side of Comrade Stalin's ideas on the state to theoreticians---they will find plenty to work on---and shall dwell only on the practical aspect of this question.
What does it consist of? One could answer this question briefly: if you really want to build communism, you must strengthen the socialist state to the utmost. (Prolonged applause.) That is our Party's view of the matter and that is the very reason why, from the first day of the victory of the Great October Revolution, our Party and our whole Soviet community, acting under the leadership of Lenin and Stalin, have been strengthening the socialist state.
I shall not here particularize on the history of our socialist state, nor is there any special need to do so. I shall only remind you that the new Constitution of the U.S.S.R., which has rightly gone into history as the Stalin Constitution, reflects the profound social and economic changes which have taken place in the country, and gives the form of law to the achievements of the Soviet people. At the same time the adoption of the Stalin Constitution signifies the further consolidation of the socialist state.
The Constitution is the fundamental law which we study from the school bench. It is to be assumed that this law is known to every citizen. Besides setting forth the organization of society and the state, the Constitution defines the principal rights and duties of citizens in the state. The legal principles embodied in the Constitution must penetrate the innermost being of every Soviet citizen so that this fundamental rule of socialist fellowship should be the guiding influence in all his conduct. Thus the Constitution shapes the actions of the millions and directs them into the channels of our basic legal principles.
The introduction of universal, direct and equal suffrage and of the secret ballot promotes in every Soviet citizen the consciousness that he has not only rights but also duties, that he must feel responsible for the Soviets he has elected, from the highest to the lowest. Thus, all the people of the Soviet Union are drawn directly into the administration of the socialist state which is strengthened to an enormous degree thereby.
The same purpose---the consolidation of the socialist state---is subserved by the delimitation of legislative and executive power, the establishment of greater control over executive power and the 354 introduction of strictly defined legal norms for the functions of all public authorities.
But people might say: this is all very fine, still, may not the measures taken to strengthen the socialist state become a hindrance to creative initiative? If creative initiative is taken to mean initiative promoting the passage from socialism to communism, I must say without any hesitation: no, these measures will not constitute the slightest hindrance to any such initiative. On the contrary, initiative which develops in conformity with the laws of the socialist state will be a (Stimulus in the general advance to communism, it will show that the principles of the socialist state are sufficiently ingrained in the minds of Soviet public servants. It will make them more sensitive to the interests and requirements of the Soviet people.
Thanks to this the principles of the socialist state will sink even more deeply into the minds of the Soviet people as a whole, they will develop an even- stronger sentiment of patriotism for their socialist state and thereby all Soviet citizens will be systematically trained to assimilate the future unwritten laws of communist society, which in due time are to acquire the force of habit.
' Therefore, the principles underlying the socialist state must be given the utmost prominence in our agitation and propaganda; above all, they must be inculcated in practice, in the course of our daily work. The most effective method of strengthening the principles underlying the socialist state is for our authorities, public organizations and individual citizens to abide by the law in all spheres of life and activity. Thus, for instance, when the Soviets issue their mandatory decisions, they must carefully scrutinize them, to prevent any contravention of general Soviet law. These decisions must be duly made public, that is, within a definitely fixed period of time, as is required by general law, so as to be able to demand that all citizens strictly comply with them. I must say, by the way, that these mandatory decisions have far greater educative value than some comrades think when they sign them.
Lastly, we must not underestimate the importance which attaches to the conduct of persons in authority, administrative, judicial and other. If persons in leading positions will endeavour to base their every act upon legal authority, they will help to strengthen socialist law and promote the unity of the people and the socialist state.
In passing, I must point out that, given these .conditions, enemies would have little opportunity to work against us in our country.
Comrades, there are still people among us who have not yet fully __PRINTERS_P_355_COMMENT__ 23* 355 grasped the meaning of the Constitution. I-shall not cite all the numerous instances that have come to my knowledge. I shall confine myself to one case which most likely many of the Congressional delegates know about. The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. has been approached by a number of persons taking us to task for not having fulfilled our obligations in the matter of organizational work among the masses. These comrades simply forget that the jurisdiction of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. is strictly defined by the Constitution, and the latter does not impose these duties on it.
It is clear that at the present time organizational work among the masses rests mainly with the Party, the trade unions, the Y.C.L. and other public organizations. However, this does not mean that the local Soviets as organs of state authority cannot engage in this work. But their mass organizational work is not mass organizational work in the usual sense of the term^ You know that the Soviets or their executive committees have no departments of propaganda or departments for organizational work among the masses, neither are special funds assigned to them for such work. The work they do along this line consists in practical administrative and political measures, in economic and cultural activities. The mass work of the Soviets, by means of which they must rally and organize the working people at large, consists in explaining to the population the various measures taken by the Soviet authorities, and enlisting the masses to carry these measures into execution. But, comrades, success in this work among the masses is out of the question unless there is direct leadership from the Party and unless the public organizations take part in it. Socialist competition and shock brigade work are eloquent examples.
We must strengthen the socialist state. We are obliged to do so primarily by conditions abroad, by the fact that we are surrounded by a capitalist world. If our socialist state were weak, then, as Comrade Stalin has so graphically put it, we would have been food for crows long ago.
Any talk about the state's withering away due to the building of socialist society seems to me far-fetched, to say the least. Actually the development of the socialist state is such that some of its functions disappear while others on the contrary are enhanced. Accordingly, the forms assumed by the socialist state also undergo change. For instance, the former system of unequal, indirect elections has been superseded by equal and direct elections to all Soviets. The 356 growth of our social, our socialist economy, has necessitated the formation of new commissariats. The CHEKA^^*^^ was reorganized into the G.P.U.,^^**^^ and then into the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs. None but the blind could fail to see that these changes represent considerable modifications in the functions of the CHEKA--- G.P.U.---P.C.I.A.
The same can be said of the Soviet court and procurator ship. As Comrade Stalin said in his report on the work of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) to the present Congress: "Now the main task of our state inside the country is the work of peaceful economic organization and cultural education. As for our army, punitive organs and intelligence service, their edge is no longer turned to the inside of the country but to the outside, against external enemies.''
Can it be said that we have no longer any use for such functions of the state as those which serve to punish people for offenses against public, socialist property? I do not think anyone but our enemies Would say so. Evidently the functions of the state which serve to defend and consolidate public, socialist property as the bedrock of our system can only begin to atrophy when every person in our country works according to his ability and receives according to his needs, when thieving and pilfering will have no purpose. But if the capitalist encirclement should still persist at that time, these functions, too, will persist, only their barb will be pointed not inside the country but outside the country, against our external enemies.
It may be assumed that a number of laws written today by the socialist state in its statute books will, in the course of time, be observed as a matter of general habit. For instance, the law on labour discipline will have been inculc'ated so firmly on people's minds that public opinion will regard any violation of it as something abnormal, and the weight of public opinion will be felt more than the present written law.
Lenin said "... when all have learned the art of administration, and will indeed independently administer social production, will independently keep tabs on the idlers, the gentlefolk, the swindlers and similar 'guardians of capitalist traditions,' the escape from this national accounting and control will inevitably become so incredibly difficult, such a rare exception, and will probably be accompanied _-_-_
^^*^^ Extraordinary Commission.---Tr.
^^**^^ State Political Administration.---Tr.
357 by such swift and severe punishment. . . that very soon the necessity of observing the simple, fundamental rules of all human intercourse will become a habit. But that will be when the higher phase of communism arrives!''Lenin goes on to say: "Until the `higher' phase of communism arrives, the Socialists demand the strictest control, by society and by the state, of the measure of labour and the measure of consumption. .. . To this extent, therefore, there is still need for a state, which, while safeguarding the common ownership of the means of production, would safeguard the equality of labour and equality in the distribution of products.''
Thus, only the state of socialist society, invested with the full economic, military and political powers of the Soviet people, can build communism. The .concrete facts of socialist society's development lead us to this conclusion.
Comrades, it is not fortuitous that Comrade Molotov has paid so much attention to the ways and means of building communist society. For, indeed, the strength of our socialist state and the security of our Soviet frontiers make it possible for us to effect a gradual transition to communism.
Take the peasantry, for instance, and the road it has to travel to communism. At the present moment, every achievement in cultural development, every betterment of the amenities of life in the Soviet countryside---every new school built, every new kindergarten opened, every new street that is being lighted, every new dining room, bath-house and movinig picture house, etc.---is a new milestone, a new step on the road to communism. In capitalist society these developments are left to chance, and, in the hands of the landowners, rich farmers and 'big business become means and instruments for enslaving, plundering and repressing the peasants more than ever. There is dialectics for you.
The cooperative societies are a glaring example. In capitalist society their avowed purpose is to make things better for the cooperators. Some visionaries even thought that they represented socialism in embryo. But, all in all, the cooperative societies abroad have fallen under the influence of capital and degenerated into collective capitalist enterprises. "There is no doubt," says Lenin "that under the capitalist state cooperative societies are collective capitalist concerns.''
Our cooperative societies are the exact opposite. The nature of cooperative societies in our country is altogether different, and therefore they constitute a link in the construction of socialism. This 358 metamorphosis, of the cooperative societies is due to the fact that ours is a socialist state which has converted cooperative enterprise from a satellite to the capitalist system into a system of socialist cooperation.
The socialist state has done much for our peasantry.
We all know what, the peasantry is coming to, under the capitalist system. We can see it in Germany, France, America, Japan, Italy and elsewhere. Slower in some countries, quicker jn others, things are leading to the one result: the ruination, the pauperization, the extinction, the destruction of the peasantry as a class.
In our country, the socialist state has put the peasantry on the highroad of economic, political and cultural progress. The socialist state has spiritualized and exalted labour not only for the workers and intellectuals, but also for the collective farm peasantry, by making it a matter of honour, valour and glory.
Let this be my closing word, comrades. There is no doubt that the reports given by Comrade Stalin and Comrade Molotov have made work very much simpler for each and every one of us. The light shed by Comrade Stalin on Marxist-Leninist theory has illumined our path of gradual transition to communism. Equipped with the ideas of Comrade Stalin and under his leadership we shall march to new victories in our struggle for the triumph of communism! (Prolonged applause rising to an ovation. Cries of "Long live Comrade Stalin." "Hurrah for Comrade Stalin!")
359 ~ [360]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
A. MIKOYAN
Comrades, the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.) will occupy a particularly prominent place in the history of our Party.
At all previous congresses, the business of the Party consisted in devising the means of securing the victory of socialism. The Eighteenth Congress is the first congress of our Party which, instead of devising ways and means of securing the victory of socialism, can proclaim the victory of socialism in our country and register the fact that our country has entered a new phase of development, the phase of completing the construction of classless, socialist society, and of the gradual transition from socialism to communism. That is why this Congress will be a turning point in the history of our Party. It has become possible for the Congress to mark this turning point, because our Central Committee has been leading the Party along the road indicated by Lenin, and because the man at the head of the Central Committee is Comrade Stalin. (Applause.)
In closing one more chapter in the history of our Party, the chapter of struggle for socialism, and opening the new chapter of struggle for the complete victory of communism, our Congress is able to announce to the World that in the U.S.S.R. the exploitation of man by man has been abolished and the causes giving rise to classes have been eliminated; the nations inhabiting our country are united in a close fraternal family of socialist citizens living in equality; from being a backward, agrarian country, our country has in the space of ten years become one of the greatest industrial powers in the world; the millions of our peasant population have in a minimum of time reorganized their life on socialist principles and, equipped with Stalin's Collective Farm Rules, are becoming increasingly cultured and prosperous.
361That, comrades, is why especial significance attaches to Comrade Stalin's statement that in our country "the first phase of communism, socialism, has, in the main, been realized." That is why we have every right to call our Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.) the Congress of socialism victorious, the Congress heralding the transition from socialism to communism. (Thunderous applause.) ;
The period between the last and the present Congress is particularly notable for the fact that we have succeeded in unearthing and destroying the nests of counter-revolution---the Trotskyite-- Bukharinite gangs, that we have out out the ulcers on the body of our Party, and as a result our Party has become even stronger, healthier and more powerful and has rallied around its Central Committee and Comrade Stalin as never before. (Loud applause, all rise.)
Comrade Stalin's report is in itself a great historic event. Comrade Stalin has cogently, simply and plainly recounted what serious difficulties our Party has overcome, what great victories it has won, and has depicted the power and strength of our country as contrasted with 'decaying capitalism, with the world of capitalism which is torn by insoluble contradictions and bloody wars bringing woe and ruin to the masses.
Comrade Stalin's report is not only a report of what has been, but a masterly forecast of what is to be, a guiding line for our Party for many years to come.
Furthermore, Comrade Stalin's report is a contribution to the theory of communism; it is an inestimable gift of Comrade Stalin's to our Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
That is why Comrade Stalin's report is a joy and an inspiration to our Party and our people as a whole in their advance to communism. (Loud applause.)
The period between the Seventeenth and the Eighteenth Congresses of the C.P.S.U. (B.) is not only rich in tremendous victories which the Party has won on the front of socialist construction; it has been an outstanding period in the history of our Party with regard to the development of theory, a period which has greatly added to the theory of communism.
Comrade Stalin has justly decried our deficiencies in the sphere of theoretical training. Now, when we look back on the five years that have elapsed since the Seventeenth Congress, we see how the gaps in our theoretical knowledge have been filled in, one by one. In these years the Party has been the author of four great and momentous historic documents which will live through the ages.
362After the Seventeenth Congress, Comrade Stalin in collaboration with membersi of the Central Committee and leading collective farmers worked out the Rules of the Agricultural Artel. These Rules tell the millions of peasants who have joined the collective farms how to live in a socialist manner. Without any precedents in history to guide him Comrade Stalin had the genius and vision to draw general principles from our short experience in collective farming and laid the foundations upon which socialism is being built in the countryside. The main thing about these Rules is that Comrade Stalin was able to correctly combine the personal interests of the collective farmers with the public interest, subordinating the personal to the social. It was this combination of interests that made it possible to win a hundred million peasants to the collective-farm system and, subordinating the personal to the social, steadily enhance the operation of the social principle.
The Stalin collective-farm rules are the efficacious constitution of collective-farm life and the collective-farm system not only for the present; they will be a guide and inspiration to the collective-farm peasantry for many years to come, until the triumph of communism. And not only for us who live in the Soviet Union. As soon as the peasantry in the capitalist countries cast off the yoke of capitalism and wish to start life afresh they will be saved the trouble of long experimentation, for in these Stalin Rules of collective-farm life they will find the answer to the question of how to build a free peasant life, how to build socialism in the countryside.
The second document of enormous theoretical importance is the Constitution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, also worked out by Comrade Stalin, which is nothing less than an exposition of the principles of the organization of socialist society. This document will also live in the ages, for it is not only a charter of liberty for the Soviet citizens, the code of our achievements, but a program for the working people the world over who are still under the yoke of capitalism. Our Stalin Constitution is a living image of socialist society. The Stalin Constitution is a guiding star for the revolutionary parties of other countries which, when they take the power into their hands, will know how to build socialist society, that is, they will know what we in our time were ignorant of.
The third momentous document issued in this iperiod is the textbook on the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.), almost entirely written by Comrade Stalin, which is at the same time a textbook on the theory of Marxism-Leninism, and has become a standard work of reference 363 for all literate people in the Soviet Union and politically advanced workers throughout the world.
Lastly, the fourth theoretical work of our Party is that part of Comrade Stalin's report at the present Congress which treats of the socialist state and the Soviet intelligentsia.
In our theory there was a gap on the question of the socialist state. Undoubtedly this deficiency could not but affect our practical work as well. Comrade Stalin has filled this gap in the theory of MarxismLeninism and has given us in his report the doctrine dealing with the socialist state and the Soviet intelligentsia. With the help of Comrade Stalin our Party has thereby completely remedied the situation on the theoretical front, and is now fully armed with the theory of MarxismLeninism, the scientific theory whose authors are Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. (Loud and prolonged applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Questions of Production of Consumers' Goods andIn his report Comrade Stalin spoke of the progress of our industry and said that we had overtaken and surpassed the capitalist countries in our rate of the growth of output and technique of production. At the same time, however, he raised the question of output per head of population. This is the first time that we stress not absolute volume of output but output per head of population. We have been used to making our comparisons run, for instance, as follows: Britain produces 7,000,000 tons of pig iron, we produce 15,000,000 tons, consequently we are ahead of Britain. Comrade Stalin's words have had the effect of a cold shower on a lot of people. And a good thing too for some hot-heads. (Laughter.) There are very many people who think: if we hold first or second place in the world, everything is all right, we can take things easy. Some of our business executives sit back in their armchairs, get swelled heads, and think there's no hurry. But why, in that case, are we short of things?
Comrade Stalin has told us why. Comrade Stalin has shown that iwe are well up in the world as regards absolute output, and that therefore we must have the ability to use the favourable position we have achieved as a bridge to new victories; our Party must use it as a lever for new effort, for further achievements. We must not become self-complacent as some people might feel inclined to do. Our achievements are so great that the problem of overtaking and surpassing the major capitalist countries in output per head of population is near solution.
364This is true not only of metallurgy, electric power stations and heavy industry in general. It applies just as much to the food industry, light industry and the production of all consumers' goods.
Comrade Stalin has time and again emphasized that we must develop the production of consumers' goods. This is part of our duty to the individual, which Comrade Stalin keeps drumming into our heads.
At the Ail-Union Conference of Stakhanovites in November 1935, Comrade Stalin said:
``... Socialism can succeed only on the basis of a high productivity of labour, higher than under capitalism, on the basis of an abundance of products, of articles of consumption of all kinds, on the basis of a prosperous and cultured life for all members of society.''
This slogan of an abundance of products and consumers' goods must be put into practice with all the pertinacity we are capable of. Here, we are impeded first of all and most of all by our light industries, textiles particularly.
Although the light industries as a whole increased their output by 82 per cent during the Second Five-Year Plan period, they did not, however, fulfil their plan.
In the light industries we are being held back mainly by textiles, chiefly the cotton industry, and this industry is being held back chiefly by the slow development of spinning. We have enough cotton to supply plenty of yarn for our weaving and hosiery mills to work on, and if the state were short of hosiery mills and weaving mills we could use the vast potentialities of the handicrafts cooperatives, but the trouble is that the spinning industry is developing too slowly.
The output of the cotton industry in 1937 was 124.3 per cent of the 1932 output. This increase is not enough; the Five-Year Plan visualized a much greater increase, the demand for fabrics in our country is growing quickly, and so remains unsatisfied.
During the First Five-Year Plan period and the first years of the Second Five-Year Plan the bottle-neck in the cotton industry was the shortage of raw material. For this reason we concentrated our efforts on increasing the output of Soviet cotton.
We have achieved really tremendous progress in this respect. .Whereas in 1913, under the tsar, the crop of cotton staple was 13,100,000 poods, in the last three years we have been picking annually an average of more than 50,000,000 poods of cotton staple, that is, 365 almost four times as much. This should have put us in a position to increase the output of cotton fabric to a much greater extent than had actually been the case.
The present situation is due to the fact that our cotton industry is not able to work up all the cotton which comes from the fields. That is why the warehouses have accumulated abnormal surpluses of cotton which we must absorb in the next year or two by rapidly increasing the capacity of the cotton industry, which should give us a greater annual increase in the output of cotton fabric than we have had so far.
This situation has arisen as a result of the fact that the People's Commissariat of Light Industry, when the wreckers were still ensconced there, invested capital not so much for the purpose of increasing the capacity of the industry in general and spinning in particular as for all kinds of ``reconstruction'' schemes which had little or no effect; they reconstructed old mills, reorganized and ``rationalized'' production, but did not increase output or, at best, increased it next to nothing.
That is why the government has had to veto the reconstruction of a number of mills into which it was contemplated to sink a lot of money without correspondingly increasing output.
Furthermore, the old equipment at our works and factories was in a neglected condition, and lacked necessary repairs. Accordingly, in the last two years, after the Party and the Government had intervened, we made it our business to recondition the greater part of the old equipment.
The textile machinery industry was badly neglected, too. But in the last eighteen months, after the Party and the Government had intervened, we have rapidly developed the production of textile machinery at our own Soviet works which in 1938 increased their output by 200,000 spindles. In 1939 the plan provides for an increase of 600,000 spindles, that is, a larger increase in this one year than in the ten previous years.
As a result of the measures taken by the Party and the Government the textile industry is getting on its feet.
The new blood we have put into the leadership of the textile industry is also beginning to show results and we may take it that the People's Commissar of the Textile Industry, Comrade Kossygin, will be able to teach the people in the textile industry how to work in a Bolshevik manner.
The question of developing the spirit of emulation among the 366 textile workers has been taken up by the local Party organizations of the textile districts, notably the Regional Party Committee of Ivanovo, where Comrade Sedin is organizing the workers in the textile industry for new victories so that by now the vast majority of the mills in the Ivanovo region are fulfilling and overfulfilling their plans.
We may take it for granted that the people in the textile industry will discard their inveterate habit of not fulfilling the program and will acquire the new habit of fulfilling the program scrupulously all the time. (Applause.)
I shall not dwell on the situation in all branches of the light and food industries, the enormous increase in output, particularly in the case of the food industry, which fulfilled both the First and the Second Five-Year Plans ahead of time and has overtaken and surpassed the main capitalist countries in the technique of production and the rate of increase of output.
I think that the People's Commissars of the several branches of the light and food industries will speak here and tell the Congress the situation in their respective industries and what tasks they are faced with.
Not long ago I was talking to two people in responsible positions •---man and wife. The wife was complaining. I asked what was the matter: was she dissatisfied with her earnings? "No, we are making good money," she said. "We have enough and to spare, thanks to the Soviet power." "Then what is your trouble?" "We cannot find a servant. We have to take time off from our work to look after the house, do the cooking, etc." She was genuinely distressed. For her it was a misfortune, but for the Soviet people as a wholei it is a piece of good fortune, good fortune because the life of the people has been so transformed, the population has become so prosperous that it is impossible to find a sufficient number of people willing to become servants, housemaids, because there is no unemployment and no poverty. (Applause.)
But, much as it may distress some people, I must say that we are going to become more and more ``unfortunate'' in this respect, because the happy people of our country will have less and less desire to work as servants---and good luck to them. (Laughter.)
What conclusions are we to draw? Work on the job has to be done, everyone cannot be at home in the kitchen. But there is a complete solution to the problem. We can arrange things so that people can work at their jobs without having to bother too much about cooking and housework when they come home.
367In this respect we have learnt a lot already and have still to learn a few things from the Americans. When the Americans were still enjoying prosperity, when there was a shortage of labour power, domestic servants were hard to get. So the Americans developed those branches of industry which make housework easy.
What must we do? We must extend the production of gas stoves and electric stoves, convenient crockery and utensils, simple devices for washing dishes, vacuum cleaners, domestic refrigerators, etc. We must open more public laundries and dry cleaning shops, more shops for repairing shoes, pressing clothes, etc. Moscow and Leningrad already have quite a number of Americanized repair shops where---if they are properly organized, as we can and must make them---people can hand over their shoes to be repaired, the job is done in fifteen or twenty minutes and at the same time you can have your suit ironed while you sit reading the newspaper. (Laughter, applause.)
We must have a pubic restaurant at every street corner, and there is really nothing to prevent us. Here, too, we must apply the principle of "overtake and surpass." We must do this without fail and be quick about it. (Applause.)
In regard to food products we must develop to the utmost the production of ready-to-cook and ready-to-serve foods such as breakfast foods prepared from maize, wheat and rice; frankfurters and sausage; canned meat and milk products, canned vegetables and fruits; tomato juice and fruit juices; fresh frozen, conserved, and parboiled vegetables, maize, string beans and peas; raw beefsteaks and chops, also hamburger steaks ready for frying, fish ready cleaned at the factory, and other produce.
Our food industry is quite ready to cope with this task.
The extent to which our food industry has developed can be judged from the following figures: in 1937 the output of canned goods was 877,200,000 cans as against 484,600,000 in 1932; the output of sausage and smoked meats in 1937 was 326,000 tons as against 59,200 tons in 1932; in 1932 there was no output of hamburger steaks, while in 1937 we produced 56,000,000; we had no output of frozen filleted fish in 1932, while in 1937 the output was 129,000 centners; we began the production of tomato juice and fruit juices in 1937, and in that very first year we produced 4,800,000 cans.
From this you see that the U.S.S.R. is employing American methods in the production of ready-to-cook and ready-to-serve foods, but not to an extent sufficient for a country like ours. For instance, the Moscow Meat Packing Plant daily produces about 300 tons of 368 sausage and frankfurters, more than 800,000 hamburger steaks ready to fry, from 15 to 17 tons of meat dumplings; and several Moscow factories controlled by the People's Commissariat of the Meat and Milk Industry (not counting dining rooms and restaurants) produce daily from 55 to 60 tons of ice cream in summer and about 25 tons in winter.
It is our duty to develop this production to the utmost not only in Moscow and Leningrad, Kharkov and Kiev, Baku and Tbilisi, but in all other cities. We have everything necessary to do so. We hope that the new People's Commissars, Comrade Zotov of the Food Industry, Comrade Smirnov of the Meat and Milk Industry and Comrade Zhemchuzhina of the Fish Industry, who have the necessary knowledge, ability and energy, will cope with this task and soon we will have an abundance, a real abundance, of first-class Soviet food products. (Applause.)
So that our womenfolk can live better and dispense with housemaids, the light industry, the needle trades, the footwear industry and the fancy goods industry must also adapt themselves to the needs of the population, manufacture clothing and footwear in the necessary sizes and styles and save our housewives the trouble of making their own clothes or altering the ready-made clothes which they buy in shops.
In 1937 the increase in the output of light industry as against 1932 was as follows: knitted outer clothing 276 per cent, knitted underwear 447.8 per cent, hosiery 223 per cent, and footwear 182 per cent. But this is still very, very little if we remember the size of our population and the great demand for these commodities. There is also a lot of room for improvement in the quality of these manufactures.
Light industry must produce all the goods that we need, including high-class articles. Are not the leaders of light industry ashamed when, for instance, a woman cannot wear a good pair of stockings without people saying they must be imported. Why can't we produce more good stockings? Or take ties---if they are attractive, people say they must be imported. It used to be the same with food products. Good drinks and liqueurs were always "from Paris," good sausage was "German," good champagne was always "French." Now in the department of food supplies we have Soviet-made produce of every kind, the quality of which is not inferior but in many cases superior -to the imported article. Why should not good stockings and igood ties be Soviet-made, not imported, why should not consumers' goods be on a par with or superior to the best foreign make?
__PRINTERS_P_369_COMMENT__ 24--263 369This problem is easy for us to solve. We have solved stupendous problems. It was pleasant to hear Comrade Voroshilov inform us that in the space of five years our country has given the Red Army 8,000,000 horseworth of motors. (Laughter.)
It can be done, and it should not take a lot of time either. All we need is just a year or two at most to organize things, and we will have a first-class output of consumers' goods. The local Party organizations in our industrial towns must also lend a hand.
The Economic Council has already taken the matter up, has obtained samples of foreign-made articles, and formed an organization which sends for managers and directors and says: "Can you make these articles or not? If you can, we'll pay you bonuses and supply you with raw material. Get busy." Hundreds of factories have already taken samples of foreign-made articles, have contracted to master the technique of their production, and are now at work. Soon we will have tens and hundreds of lines of Soviet-made goods equal to the best foreign samples.
We must raise the quality of our wares to such a high level that people will not want to look at foreign-made articles any more. We must make Moscow and Leningrad articles the best, not those from Paris and London. It can be done. If the people in the People's Commissariats of the light industries want to be real Bolsheviks, they must accomplish this in a minimum of time.
There is something else I should like to draw your attention to. Business executives in our country are very much spoiled. Our country is very rich in raw materials of all kinds, there is plenty of highgrade cotton, and you can have as much high-grade flax as you like. Low-grade cotton is thrown away, cotton waste is treated as refuse, waste is regarded as nothing more than just waste. But abroad they know how to make the same articles from cotton waste as from good raw material. Why cannot we utilize cotton waste? Why this selfindulgence? We can utilize it, too, we can do the same, only many of our directors and managers are too pampered. We must make them work properly.
What have we done in this direction? Last year, on Comrade Stalin's advice, we announced that we would pay bonuses to business executives for the utilization of low-grade cotton. Now I have information from the People's Commissariat of Light Industry that surplus stocks of low-grade cotton, instead of increasing as they used to, have been greatly reduced.
You see, we only have to get down to work and we will have 370 everything. We must fight for the conversion of waste into wares; then we will have more raw material and things will be cheaper. So far the steps made by our light industry in this direction have been very timid.
Now that the People's Commissariats have been divided up, the textile industry separately and the light industry separately, we have the right to expect that the people in light industry and the People's Commissar of Light Industry, Comrade Lukin, will get down to work in real earnest to supply the population with enough clothing, knitgoods, fancy goods and footwear.
We must bear in mind that the People's Commissariats of the light industries and food industries alone will not solve the problem of supplying the population. Many commodities are produced by the People's Commissariats of the heavy industries, and the other industrial People's Commissariats are also producing consumers' goods. For instance, metal bedsteads and furniture, time pieces, radios, gramophone records, gramophones, bicycles, refrigerators, hardware, spoons and other articles are made by various People's Commissariats, including the People's Commissariats of the heavy industries and local industries. Stainless steel and nickel-plated steel are used for consumers' (goods in large quantities. We must get these People's Commissariats to look at consumers' goods not as something of thirdrate importance but work in real earnest to produce consumers' goods.
At the Seventeenth Party Congress, Comrade Stalin said that we must
``... 6) develop the production of consumers' goods in all the industries controlled by the economic commissariats.
``7) develop local Soviet industry, to give it the opportunity to display initiative in regard to the production of consumers' goods and to give it all possible assistance in the way of raw materials and funds.''
We must say flatly that this injunction of Comrade Stalin's is not being acted upon sufficiently; our opportunities are unlimited, the demand is great, but so far we have done little.
Comrade Stalin has already cited figures showing the tremendous development of trade in our counry, both in the urban districts and In the villages. But we must say outright that the requirements of the population, the prosperity and income of the population are growing faster than the volume of trade, so that there is a gap between the rates of growth of the demand and the rates of development of __PRINTERS_P_371_COMMENT__ 24* 371 trade. That is why we must increase the volume of trade and take energetic measures to improve trading.
The Central Committee of the Party and the Council of People's Commissars of the U.S.S.R. have been paying special attention to the matter of increasing the delivery of goods to the countryside and improving the work of the consumers' cooperatives. Radical changes have been made in the work of the Central Council of Cooperative Societies and the cooperative stores are now beginning to work better. The wreckers who at one time headed this organization have been replaced by honest and conscientious people.
There is already a noticeable improvement in trading in our cities, but we are still short of trained staffs, our organization is still insufficient to discharge adequately the tasks with which we are faced. These are tasks which we still have to carry out and we expect the local organizations to make serious efforts to improve trade, because this work cannot be properly handled from the centre, by the People's Commissariat of Trade and the Central Council of Cooperative Societies alone.
There has been some confusion in prices, due to the fact that the wholesale prices were fixed by the government, while the retail prices were fixed by the local trading departments and branches of the Cooperative Societies by adding an additional charge to cover overhead, transport expenses, etc. Often this gave rise to abuses. Yet think of the number of clerks it would have taken to calculate the prices properly.
Now the government has adjusted matters by putting fixed retail prices on most commodities, and the consumer can now check prices with the price lists endorsed by the Economic Council which nobody has the right to change.
There were also irregularities in the wholesale prices of the textile industry, as a result of which the industry had super-profits from some grades of fabrics, and heavy losses provided for in the plan on other grades. Managers and directors concentrated on overfulfilling the plan for the profitable lines and underproduced the unprofitable lines, although the latter are just as important to us as the former.
Now all this has been put right by the government.
Some people have a craze for huge department stores. They want to have bigger stores than there are in America, although at the present moment they are not suitable for us. We need more shops of medium and small size well-distributed through the cities and districts.
372Our trade turnover has increased by 178 per cent, while the number of stores has increased only by 25 per cent. This is not enough. We must build more stores.
The situation with warehouses is even worse. While the volume of trade has increased so enormously the number of warehouses in the last five years has increased only by 35 per cent. We are short of warehouses, commodities are stored in unsuitable places, sometimes they spoil, the shortage of warehouses gives rise to abuses and makes theft easy.
In remote districts warehouses are especially necessary to lay up stocks against delays in the delivery of goods and so that a proper assortment of commodities can be kept in stock and the stores^supplied to insure steady sale.'S.
Last year, Comrade Stalin already drew our attention to the fact that the People's Commissariat of Trade and the Central Council of Cooperative Societies prefer to trade in the central districts and are reluctant to ship commodities to the more remote districts. But very important things are being done in those districts; many industrial enterprises are located in those districts and grain and industrial crops are grown there.
In a special resolution on this subject the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars declared: "Due to the great increase in the output of agriculture in all departments---igrain and stock-raising, as well as industrial crops---the demand of the peasant population for consumers' goods is growing hourly. But the organs of the People's Commissariat of Trade and particularly the Central Council of Cooperative Societies are ignoring the countryside and some of the urban districts, they do not know the demands of the countryside and are reluctant to deliver commodities to the countryside,"
Much has been done in the past period to amend these anomalies and improve trade in general, and in the countryside and remote urban districts in particular, but there is still a lot of work ahead before the army of workers in the trading apparatus begin to work in a real Bolshevik manner.
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Questions of Foreign TradeComrades, allow me to make a few comments on the question of foreign trade.
373International trade has suffered radical changes which are due to the situation in the capitalist countries outlined by Comrade Stalin in his report. Some countries, like -Germany and Italy, have already adopted the economic methods of war time. Other countries, rich in gold currency, are taking steps in the same direction. Many countries have prohibited the export and exchange of currency, compelling people to spend the proceeds from their sales in the same country or leave them in a frozen state in the banks, in other words, compelling them to finance that country.
Nowadays, buying and selling is not confined to exchanges, syndicates and individual firms, but takes place in the cabinets of bourgeois governments. Now it is not so much competition between private firms that decides how a commodity sells on the market, as state intervention, disguised and undisguised, and agreements on export and import quotas betweeen states.
Hence questions of foreign trade are becoming more and more definitely bound up with the foreign policy of the various states.
In our trade abroad we have to take into consideration the system of foreign trade established in the various countries and the political relations that exist between the U.S.S.R. and these countries; for trading relations, their character arid volume, are directly dependent on political relations. Hence the difference in the character of the trade agreements concluded between the U.S.S.R. and other countries.
We have recently concluded a number of agreements. The negotiations which lasted for a whole year between the U.S.S.R. and Italy recently ended in the signing of an agreement concerning the volume of trade with that country. Our country has also concluded a trade agreement with Poland.
The victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. has radically changed the character of the foreign trade of our Union. What are these changes?
During the First Five-Year Plan period our foreign trade balance and our balance of payments were very unfavourable. From 1928 through 1932 the excess of imports over exports was 465,500,000 American dollars, whereas in the last five years, from 1933 through 1937, we had a favourable balance of 455,300,000 American dollars. Formerly, when we were short of gold currency, we often resorted to credits advanced by various banks at very high rates; the firms exacted heavy interest charges from us, many of them became very rich. Now we have not only given up using such credits, but to avoid the payment of heavy interest on previous credits we have paid them up before they fell due. We have begun to buy more on a cash basis, 374 to avoid paying too dear. Now we often refuse credits that are offered to us; we take them only when they are cheap and extended for long terms.
When we were still poor and backward, when we had no highly developed machine-bulding industry of our own, while we had to ibuild up industry at any cost, we were compelled to export large amounts of raw material and foodstuffs, which we needed ourselves, in order to get the foreign currency with which we bought machines for our industry, equipment for our tractor and automobile works.
For .instance, in 1933, we exported 37,200 tons of butter, 23,300 tons of vegetable oil, 19,000 crates of eggs, 2,300 tons of bacon and 5,000 tons of poultry.
Now we export neither butter nor vegetable oil, neither eggs, bacon nor poultry, because we are extending home consumption, and all the increase, as well as the high-class products which we used to export; goes to our own shops. (Applause.)
Although we have greatly increased the output of gasoline, kerosene, iron ore and some other commodities, the export of these commodities has been cut down or stopped completely. We are using them for internal consumption.
Now, with the victory of socialism, the country has become so rich that we can afford to leave all necessities inside the country and export only our surpluses.
Our country is now so strong economically that she can more or less fully satisfy her o>wn requirements without imports. Most of our imports are made in order to speed up the growth of certain industries and to develop them at a faster rate than is at present possible with our own resources.
The character of our imports also deserves special attention. Most of them consists of machinery equipment and machine tools.
The most remarkable thing is that, for instance, while in 1928 the ratio of imported machinery as compared with the domestic Soviet output of machinery was 43 per cent, it has dropped in 1937-38 to 0'.94 per cent, not so much because we have cut down our imports, as because we have increased the domestic, Soviet output of machinery.
This is proof of the tremendous changes that have taken place in the economic life of the U.S.S.R., showing that we are really an industrial country producing machinery in enormous quantities.
In capitalist countries the crisis is leading to a drop in exports and imports. In our country, however, while there has been a certain drop 375 in exports and imports, it has been entirely due to the increase of production on the basis of extended consumption. For instance, our imports of iron and steel have dropped from 908,000 tons in 1932 to 145,000 tons in 1938. This is not because we are using less metal. No, our consumption of metal has increased tremendously. The point is that the Soviet output of metal has also increased. We are importing natural rubber somewhat less than in 1928-29, though the consumption of rubber has increased several times over.
Or take tea, the imports of which have also been reduced. In 1932 we imported 15,900 tons, wfhile last year, in 1938, we imported only 13,000 tons. But the consumption of tea has not declined, it has greatly increased. Yet, as Comrade Charkviani has told us here, when all the shrubs which we have planted reach full maturity, we will no longer import tea and spend gold currency on it. In 1932, we consumed 16,500 tons of tea, of which only 600 tons was Soviet tea, while in 1938 we consumed 20,000 tons of tea, of which 7,000 tons was Sqyiet tea. But Comrade Charkviani says that by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period Georgia alone is going to give us 20,000 tons of Soviet tea; and Azerbaijan, too, is growing tea.
Now we have our own tea; moreover, our tea is just as good and, if anything, better and more tasty than the foreign product because this is our own Soviet tea, not foreign tea. (Applause.)
In the same way we are buying less citrus fruits abroad, not because we are eating less---the people are eating more and more of them, every year---but because we are getting them from sunny Georgia. We have flourishing groves of lemon, tangerine and orange trees which in 1938 gave us 240,000,000 fruits and in 1939 will give us about 500,000,000 fruits; and in a few years time, when the trees we have planted mature, we will have more than 2,000,000,000 citrus fruits from places which were once the preserve of mosquitoes and malaria, the domain of poverty. The Communists of Georgia, led by Comrade Lavrenti Beria, have done splendid work in Western Georgia, where there are now some corners better than California; and the time is not far off when we shall have our own Soviet California, better than the American. (Applause.)
We are improving the methods of work in our foreign trade, and we are changing our methods of planning.
We have already rid our foreign trade apparatus of the spies and wreckers who used state funds to line the pockets of Trotskyite scoundrels. |
We shall staff all departments of the People's Commissariat of 376 Foreign Trade abroad with tried people utterly devoted to the Soviet power, worthy representatives of the Soviet Union, firm as lock in the face of capitalism and its corrupting influence, impervious to all attempts on their integrity on the part of foreign espionage services. We are choosing true sons of our country for work abroad, so that we may be proud of our Soviet officials working in foreign countries. (Applause.)
__ALPHA_LVL2__ Selection of Personnel and Check on FulfilmentComrades, our Party would have achieved much niore than it has if -we had worked better, if the organizational work of the Party had been entirely on a par with the political line of our Party.
Lenin always said that, given a correct line to start with, the main thing in our work is selection of personnel and checking on fulfilment. Comrade Stalin has been teaching us the same thing.
At the Seventeenth Party Congress Comrade Stalin devoted a special section of his report to the question of checking on fulfilment and selecting personnel. This was not just a section in a report, it was a complete theory of organization, an exposition of the organizational science of Bolshevism.
We are still unable to work with thorough Bolshevik efficiency. The desire alone to work in Bolshevik fashion is not enough. We must re-educate ourselves, we must develop character, we must go about the business of checking on fulfilment in a systematic way.
Here is what Comrade Stalin said at the Seventeenth Congress:
``After the correct line has been given, after a correct solution of the problem has been found, success depends on the manner in which the work is organized, on the organization of the struggle for the application of the Party line, on the proper selection of personnel, on supervising the fulfilment of the decisions of the leading organs. Otherwise, the correct line of the Party and the correct solutions are in danger of being seriously prejudiced. Furthermore, after the correct political line has been given, the organizational work decides everything, including the fate of the political line itself, i.e., its success or failure.... The main thing in organizational work is the selection of personnel and supervision of fulfilment of decisions."
Real leadership consists not only in working out the correct solution of problems, but also in taking steps to ensure the fulfilment of decisions, in assigning fulfilment to people who have been properly 377 tested, in checking up on fulfilment and intervening, making the necessary corrections if the need arises, until the work is brought to a conclusion.
But it is all too often the case that after a good decision has been written (which means a lot, of course) people proceed to make other good decisions without caring how the first decision is being carried out.
A good decision without provision for its fulfilment is like firing blank cartridges. Decisions often become blank cartridges because the people who take them make no provision to ensure fulfilment, the persons who are to carry out the decision are not properly instructed, and there is no check on fulfilment in the process of the work.
Such a practice, apart from everything else, spoils our personnel, because they get used to ignoring or only half-observing decisions from above. What kind of Bolshevik work do you call that, if a good decision is made and not put into practice? The result is a discrepancy between words and deeds, and Comrade Stalin teaches us that there must be no discrepancy between a Bolshevik's word and his deeds, that words and deeds must be in full accord. Unless we ensure check on fulfilment, such discrepancy will inevitably follow.
For instance, how do we test people? We verify the answers given in the questionnaire and let it go at that. It is true that questionnaires are necessary, but we cannot see who is who by questionnaires alone. Systematic check on fulfilment, however, will show us who is working well and who is loafing, who is a conscientious worker and who is a saboteur and a bureaucrat, who is honest and capable and who is hopeless, who should be promoted and encouraged and whose services are to be dispensed with.
In the last two or three years the Party has greatly improved organizational work, and done much to bring its organizational work to the level of the political line. We cannot say yet that organizational work is fully on a par with the political line, but the progress which the Party has made in this sphere, and consistent adherence to Comrade Stalin'is recommendations at the Seventeenth Party Congress concerning the selection of personnel and check on fulfilment, must bring about an improvement raising organizational work to the same high level of development as that of the political line of the Party.
Comrades, no successes, however great, can surprise us now. Nothing can surprise our people and nothing can affright them. Why is this so? Because history has been generous in bestowing victories upon us. To whom do we owe it that a country like ours, populated 378 by so many millions, has united into one whole, into an invincible socialist state? We owe this to Lenin, that great genius of humanity, who was able not only to apply consistently the revolutionary theory of Marx and Engels in Russia, but also to develop it, enlarge upon it by adding the doctrine of the proletarian revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat.
We owe it to Lenin for having, together with Comrade Stalin, reared the Bolshevik Party in the struggle against tsarism, trained it in the spirit of Bolshevik intransigence and adherence to principle, led the October Revolution, ensured victory in the Civil War and the transition to the reconstruction of our shattered industry.
The fact that we have brought about the victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. we owe to the worthy continuator of Lenin's cause--- our great Comrade Stalin, who at the graveside of Lenin, speaking on behalf of the Party and the Soviet people as a whole, uttered a solemn oath to keep the great flag of communism flying, to be true to the end to Lenin's behests and indefatigably continue the cause which Lenin began. (Applause.)
We can say positively that Comrade Stalin, at the head of the Party, is faithfully keeping his vow. (Applause.)
Comrade Stalin has rendered a service great beyond compare in that he has developed and amplified the doctrine of Lenin in the era of the construction of socialist society just as Lenin before him developed and amplified the doctrine of Marx in the era of proletarian revolutions. Comrade Stalin has demonstrated scientifically that socialism can be built victoriously in one country, he has given us the doctrine of the construction of socialist society, the doctrine of the socialist state and the socialist intelligentsia. We rightly consider the theory of communism to be the theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. (Applause.)
Moreover, Comrade Stalin has ensured the practical solution of the most difficult problem of the Russian revolution, the problem of reorganizing peasant farming along socialist lines and winning the one hundred million peasants for the collective-farm system.
If we have achieved this historic victory which the best minds of humanity could not even dream of being possible to win in such a short time, if we have brought it about that our peasants who for centuries lived each unto himself have begun to live socialistically, this is only due to the leadership of the true and worthy disciple of Lenin, our great Stalin. (Applause.)
379Stalin, like Lenin, is a leader of the highest stamp. He is a mountain eagle, fearless in struggle, boldly leading the Bolshevik Party and the Soviet people onward over paths untrod to the complete victory of communism.
Long live the invincible Party of Lenin and Stalin!
Honour to Stalin, our great leader!
(An outburst of applause. The delegates rise and accord Comrade Stalin a prolonged ovation. Cheers: "Hurrah for our great Stalin!")
[380]
__ALPHA_LVL1__
N. KHRUSHCHOV
Comrades, we have heard at our Eighteenth Party Congress a report of struggle for communism, the struggle of our workers, peasants and intellectuals, of all the working people of our Soviet land, led by our Party and its Stalinist Central Committee, directed by the genius of our great guide and leader, Comrade Stalin. (Storm of applcuse, breaking into an ovation. All rise.)
In his report, Comrade Stalin has arrayed before us the great achievements of our Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in the struggle for communism. We have achieved victories in all departments of our socialist construction. Socialism holds full and undivided sway in all branches of the national economy. We have abolished the exploitation of mvan by man. Year by year we are coming nearer to the ultimate goal of our struggle, the pinnacle of all our endeavours---- communist society, the communist order.
The successes we have scored did not come by themselves. They were gained in [strenuous battle with the enemies of the working class, the enemies of the peasantry, the enemies of the whole people, in combat with agents of fascist espionage services----the Trotskyites, Bukharinites and bourgeois nationalists.
Despite all the hectic activity of the capitalist spy organizations, despite all the efforts of the public enemies I have mentioned, we are advancing victoriously to communism. Under the leadership of the great Bolshevik Party, under the leadership of Comrade Stalin, the working class and the people as a whole have broken the enemies' resistance, swept them to destruction and are continuing their victorious advance to communism.
381The Ukrainian people are full of hatred for the bourgeois nationalists, for all abominable spies like Lubchenko, Khvylja, Zatonsky and other vermin. These monsters, these outcasts of human society, are the.accursed of the people of the Soviet Ukraine.
The fascists of Poland and Germany were banking on them. With the assistance of these enemies of the Ukrainian people, they wanted to enslave the prosperous Soviet Ukraine. But nothing came of it and never will! The fate of the base and execrable bourgeois nationalists, whom the people have destroyed like mad dogs, is in store for anyone who* lays hand on the territory of the liberty-loving Ukrainian people. (Loud applause.)
But our successes in the fight for communism must not weaken our will, must not make us any less tenacious in the struggle with our enemies. We must firmly remember all that our great Stalin has said about the capitalist encirclement in which we live. Our successes must serve to make us more and more vigilant and sharpen our weapons to destroy all enemies without mercy.
Every Bolshevik, every worker, every citizen of our Soviet land is clear in his mind that our success, our victory in defeating the fascist agents---all these despicable Trotskyites, Bukharinites and bourgeois nationalists---we owe above all to the personal efforts of our great leader, Comrade Stalin. (Loud applause.)
In his report, Comrade Stalin has shown the full immensity of the development of our socialist economy, of the growth of our industry and agriculture, the rise in the standard of living of the people and the cultural progress of our country. He has shown us what tremendous achievements are ours as a result of weeding out the enemies of the people from our Bolshevik Party. Our Bolshevik ranks have grown immeasurably stronger. The Communist Party of the Ukrainian Bolsheviks is firm and strong as never before. It is connected in every fibre with all the other detachments of the Party of Lenin and Stalin, and stands solid like a wall of steel around the Stalinist Central Committee, around its beloved leader---our great Stalin. (Prolonged applause.)
The devotion of the Bolsheviks of the Ukraine to Comrade Stalin reflects the boundless confidence and devotion which he enjoys among the whole Ukrainian people.
Comrades, in his report Comrade Stalin has demonstrated to us the historic victories leading to communism. Allow me to recount what the Ukrainian people have iSO far achieved in the struggle for communism. The Soviet Ukraine is a country of inexhaustible 382 natural wealth. Her territory is rich in coal, iron and manganese. The first geological surveys showed that the Ukraine also has oil and still other resources. The Ukraine has belts of fine black soil which abundantly yields not only Ukrainian wheat and sugar beet but also tobacco, cotton and other industrial crops.
But the chief asset of the Soviet Ukraine is its people, its legions of brave, talented men and women. The riches of the Ukraine, which borders on capitalist states, have always attracted marauders, ancient and modern, gentlemen of fortune, the world's adventurers. We know from history how the Ukraine was invaded by German robber knights and Polish magnates. But history also bears, witness to' the ignominious failure of these adventurers. (The Ukrainian people -gave many a sound thrashing to the German barons and the Polish gentry. But some cut-throats have evidently forgotten these lessons. The fascist barbarians are haunted in their sleep by the riches of the Ukrainian people, are continually harbouring schemes of invasion against the Ukraine to wrest them away. In pursuance of their nefarious designs they have been and are still despatching their spies into our country, recruiting traitors, trying to penetrate into' our factories, collective farms and state farms.
Not so long ago some collective farmers detained two passersby dressed like beggars. Their bedraggled appearance made them so conspicuous that our collective farmers grew suspicious of them. These ragamuffins proved to be a couple of first-class spies. Apparently the Polish espionage service had coached them^badly on the way people are dressed in the Ukraine.
The Ukrainian workers and collective farmers are becoming increasingly vigilant. We will do our utmost to cultivate these qualities and exterminate like vermin all the foul creatures which the foreign espionage services furtively deposit on Ukrainian soil. The Ukrainian people has made havoc of these enemies and traitors, and rallied closer than ever around the Bolshevik Party and around our great leader, Comrade Stalin. (Applause.)
Under the leadership of the Stalinist 'Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.), under the leadership of Comrade Stalin, the Bolsheviks of the Ukraine have achieved great successes in the development of industry, both under All-Union control and under the control of the Republic. They have increased the output of coal and metal and are developing light industry, the food industry and railway transportation.
The following fact may serve to illustrate the extent to which our 383 industries have grown. During thle Stalinist Second Five-Year Plan period, the output of pig iron in the Ukraine increased one hundred odd per cent. The Kirov iron and steel mill at Makeyevka smelts alone twice as much pig iron as all the mills in Poland. This one fact should give some people something of a reminder as to the strength of the Soviet Ukraine. Under the Stalinist Second Five-Year Plan the output of steel has increased almost three-fold. The mills of the Ukraine produce as much steel as Japan, Italy and Poland put together. In comparison with 1913 the machine-building industry has increased its output thirty times over. The Ukraine mines twice as much coal as all Poland.
Our socialist industries have vastly expanded. The people who man them have greatly gained in number and stature. The quality of output is constantly improving, labour productivity is on the increase, labour discipline is becoming firmer and people adopt more and more a socialist attitude towards work and the economy of their country.
Agriculture in the Soviet Ukraine has made rapid headway: 96.7 per cent of the peasant households have joined collective farms. The collective farms include 99.7 per cent of the entire sown area. The Ukraine's socialist agriculture is highly mechanized: in 1933 we had 39,000 tractors, now, in 1939, we have 90,000. In 1934 we had 4,900 harvester combines, now we have 28,800. We also have a tremendous number of complex threshers, and tractor ploughs and seeders.
All efforts expended by the collective farmers accrue to their own benefit. They till their own soil and harvest for themselves. They cultivate their fields with modern machines---harvester combines, tractors, tractor-drawn seeders, threshers and other mechanical appliances. The proportion of mechanically cultivated land to the total tilled area has greatly increased.
In 1934, 51 per cent of the total ploughing was done by tractors, while in 1938 the proportion was about 82 per cent. In 1934, 2 per cent of the total cereal crop, including millet, was gathered by harvester combines, while in 1938 the proportion was 51 per cent.
In 1934, only 9 per cent of the total area under sugar beet was machine-picked. By 1938 the proportion had risen to 85 per cent.
These figures show how the mechanization of agriculture has grown in our collective farms.
We have thus been enabled to cultivate our fields with a great saving of time, which is of the essence in agriculture, and have made 384 work much easier for the collective farmers. We have effected a great improvement in tillage. This high level of mechanization in our agriculture enables us Ukrainians to respond to Comrade Stalin's appeal for collective farms to supply man-power to our industries.
The yield of cereals, sugar beet and all other crops is constantly increasing.
Besides improving our records in cereal and beet growing we can report great progress in the cultivation of new industrial crops. The planting of cotton in the Ukraine has proved a success. It is a very remunerative crop and one that the collective farmers have taken a liking to. The yields obtained are good. We are also developing oil-bearing crops and industrial crops for special purposes.
In the Ukraine we have vast stretches of land under sugar beet. The yield of sugar beet is increasing year by year. Despite the unfavourable weather conditions of 1938, the Ukraine has rounded the year with a good showing. This proves that as a result of the reorganization of agriculture, of the association of the peasants in collective farms, of the high degree of mechanization in agriculture and of the victory of socialism in the countryside, Ukrainian farming has been given stability and is yielding handsome harvests.
Comrades, our economic and cultural growth, the improvement in the general standard of living, makes it incumbent upon us to satisfy the various needs of the population which are increasing in consequence.
There are vast possibilities of getting bigger yields of sugar beet from the same area than we have been hitherto. According to our calculations the increase in sugar beet yield can be made sufficiently great to fully ensure a sugar beet crop of the dimensions specified in the Third Five-Year Plan.
We believe that the sugar beet harvest planned for the end of the third five-year period, can be secured by adopting the following methods:
1) By changing the dates for sugar beet picking. At present the date fixed for starting this work is September 10. In order to secure high yields we should set a later date, say from the 20th, to the 25th of September. At this time, vegetation and increase in weight are most intense.
2) By putting more mineral fertilizer into the soil and using it more rationally. This will also be very effective in augmenting yield.
3)- By a more thoroughgoing application of scientific agricultural measures, and by further mechanizing cultivation and picking.
__PRINTERS_P_385_COMMENT__ 25---263 3854) By preventive measures against pests (sugar beet weevil), Which do tremendous damage in the sugar beet fields every year.
Comrades, we can speak with satisfaction of the Ukraine's record for socialist stock-raising.
From 1934 through 1938 the head of horses in the Ukraine increased by 21 per cent. This in spite of all that the Polish spies and bourgeois nationalists did to ruin stockraising and, first and foremost, to exterminate our horses. The number of cattle has doubled. Hogs have nearly tripled in number. In the case of sheep and goats we have had a more than two-fold increase.
These figures speak a most eloquent language. They show what progress the Bolsheviks of the Ukraine have made in the fight for the development of stock-raising on the collective and state farms.
When we study this question, we see that the Soviet Ukraine has riot exhausted her possibilities by far. We have everything necessary to achieve even greater progress in the development of stock-raising and to do it in a minimum of time. Thus we shall accomplish the task which Comrade Stalin has put before the Party and the entire country.
An analysis shows that only 66 per cent of the collective farms in the Ukraine have cattle-breeding departments. Only 83 per cent of our collective farms have hog-raising departments. A mere 45 per cent of the collective farms have sheep-raising and 12 per cent have mixed livestock departments.
By regions we get the following picture: in the Poltava region, cattle-breeding departments exist on only 54 per cent,of the collective farms, in the Kharkov region also only 54 per cent, in the KamenetsPodolsk region---60 per cent, and in the Chernigov region---65 per cent.
Thus we see that some of our collective farms are altogether without cattle-raising, hog-raising and sheep-raising departments.
Now let us see what room for improvement there is on the collective farms which do have stock-raising departments.
In the Ukraine 7 per cent of the collective-farm stock-raising departments have only younglings.
17 per cent of the stock-raising departments have, besides younglings, from 1 to 4 cows,
23 per cent---from 5 to 9 cows,
19 per cent---from 10 to 15 cows,
16 per cent---from 16 to 25 cows,
13 per cent---from 26 to 50 cows,
386and only 5 per cent of the departments have from 51 cows upward.
Consequently, 47 per cent of the stock-raising departments in the collective farms have less than 10 cows each. Comrades, these figures show the enormous extent to which our collective farms can be improved. We could increase the head of cattle , in our stock-raising departments without any particular effort. These figures speak for themselves. No great strain is required. All that is needed here is Bolshevik attention, and the number of stock-breeding departments and of the head of cattle will enormously increase on all collective farms.
The wreckers---the Trotskyites, Bukharinites and bourgeois nationalists---did everything to ruin stock raising in the Ukraine. We Bolsheviks of the Ukraine must take the leadership of the stockraising departments in hand and make the Ukrainian collective farmers more prosperous thereby.
As a result of the consolidation of the collective farms and the tremendous assistance which the state has rendered to the collective farmers in the form of machines, credits and mineral fertilizers, the Ukrainian collective farms are thriving and the incomes of the collective farms and their members are increasing.
Here are a few figures showing the enormous growth of collective farm incomes! Total incomes of collective farms increased from 1934 through 1938 by 250 per cent. The amount paid out for workday-units increased 430 per cent. The annual cash income per collective farm household increased by 420 per cent.
The increase in the income of the collective farmers is shown by the following figures:
In 1934, 80 per cent of the collective farms paid only 2 kilograms of grain or less per work-day-unit. By 1937 collective farms had greatly increased their incomes, to the extent that only in 16 per cent of them, instead of 80 per cent as in 1934, was 2 kilograms of grain or less paid per work-day-unit.
In 1934, 14 per cent of the collective farms paid from 2. to 3 kilograms per work-day-unit; in 1937, 27.4 per cent were paying that much.
In 1934, only 5.6 per cent of the collective farms paid from 3 to 5 kilograms per work-day-unit, while in 1937 this quantity was paid by 42.4 per cent of the collective farms.
In 1934, only 0.7 per cent of the collective farms in the Ukraine 387 paid 5 kilograms and over, while in 1937 the same amount was paid by 14 per cent of the collective farms.
This shows what a great number of collective farms have moved up in the scale of income per work-day-unit.
Such is the result of the Bolshevization of the Ukrainian collective farms; there you have it in action, Stalin's policy of making the collective farmers prosperous.
I consider it necessary, comrades, to cite also a few statistics on the consumption of bread in the Ukraine. In 1937 the baking of black bread decreased by 35 per cent while the baking of white bread in this twelve-month increased 310 per cent. But in vain do the fascist chieftains cast a covetous eye upon our Ukrainian wheat fields. They would be well advised to bear in mind that any attempt to raid our Ukrainian larder for bread is very apt to cost the raider his head. (Laughter, applause.) The Ukrainian people themselves prefer white bread and will dent the skull of anyone who sticks his dirty snout into our Soviet garden. (Applause.)
We have made great progress in the development of culture in the Ukraine. If we consult the figures showing the expenditure on public education, we find that: in 1927 appropriations for schools, vocational high schools and institutions of higher education amounted to 141,000,000 rubles; in 1932, to 597,000,000 rubles, and in 1938, to 2,830,000,000 rubles. The payroll of school teachers has increased from 205,000,000 rubles in 1932 to 1,106,000,000 rubles in 1939. Between 1933 and 1938 the number of schools in the Ukraine has greatly increased. Especially great during the Stalinist Second FiveYear Plan period was the increase in the number and attendance of the secondary schools. In 1932-33 there were 261 secondary schools, while in 1937-38 there were 2,531 such schools, that is, an increase of 2,270, or 870 per cent.
There also have been qualitative changes. The increase in the number of secondary schools in the Ukraine has been not only absolute but also relative. In 1932-33 the secondary schools were attended by 224,000 children while in 1937-38 they were attended by 1,709,000 children, that is, an increase of 660 per cent.
The number of institutions of higher education in the Ukraine has also increased. In 1914 there were only 19 universities and colleges, attended by 26,000 students; now, in 1939, we have in the Ukraine 121 universities and colleges, attended by 122,000 students. The number of Soviet-trained personnel graduated by the institutions of higher education of the Ukraine is growing every year. 388 During the Stalinist First Five-Year Plan period, 39,000 people graduated from universities and colleges, during the Second Five-Year Plan period, 64,000 persons. In 1938 alone 20,000 graduated from universities and colleges, and in 1939 21,000 will graduate. This is a great influx into the vast army of the Soviet intelligentsia, an influx of men and women sprung from the various categories of the working people. They have come to our offices, factories and collective farms and with the rest of our working people are actively engaged in the struggle for the construction of communist society.
The culture of the Soviet Ukraine, national in form and socialist in content, is also developing rapidly. Ukrainian literature is making great progress. Art is flourishing. Only a few days ago the Ukrainian people were honouring the memory of their great poet----Taras Shevchenko. At Kiev more than 200,000 people gathered at his monument. Shevchenko evenings were held all over the Soviet Union. This is a significant fact.
For many centuries the Ukrainian people fought the tsarist autocracy, the landlords and capitalists. They fought for the right to develop" their native culture, build their own schools, publish their literature, and study in their mother tongue. And only as a result of the Great October Socialist Revolution, as. a result of the triumph of the national policy of Lenin and Stalin, as a result of the special attention paid by Comrade Stalin to the development of Ukrainian culture, have we achieved such momentous victories in the development of culture.
That is why the Ukrainian people proclaim with all their heart and soul, with the utmost affection and devotion: "Khai Zhive Ridny Stalin!" "Long live our beloved Stalin!" (Thunderous applause, growing to an ovation. All rise. Cheers of "Long live Comrade Stalin!")
In the Ukraine, as throughout the Soviet Union, the Bolshevik ranks are now! more firmly welded than ever, the people are more united than ever in their loyalty to the Bolshevik Party, their leader and teacher, the friend of the Ukrainian people, Comrade Stalin. (Applause.)
The fascist aggressors will come to grief before our serried ranks. At- the first call of their Bolshevik Party, at the first call of Comrade Stalin, the Ukrainian people will rise like one man in defence of their socialist country. (Applause.)
Let them be advised, these masters of the Carpathian Ukraine, these masters of the gnat alluded to by Comrade Stalin, that the 389 Ukrainian people are ready to administer a crushing blow to all who may attempt to defile with their dirty jackboots the hallowed socialist soil of the free Soviet Ukraine. (Applause.)
In this struggle the Ukrainian people will fight side by side with the great Russian people who have already come more than once to the assistance of the Ukrainian people in their struggle against the enemies of the Ukraine. (Applause.)
The federation of the Ukrainian people with the great Russian people and all the nations united in the Soviet Union is invincible.
Comrades! The Eighteenth Party Congress, the historic precepts of our great Stalin, arm the people of the Soviet Union, arm the working people of the whole world, with a mighty weapon in the struggle for communism. Comrade Stalin's doctrine of the socialist state in a capitalist encirclement, the profound new ideas that Comrade Stalin's report has introduced into the question of the Soviet intelligentsia, are a great contribution to the treasure store of MarxismLeninism, and mark a higher stage in the development of Leninism.
Long live the friendship of the peoples of the great Soviet Union! (Thunderous applause.)
Long live the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the party of the Bolsheviks, the leader and organizer of socialist victory! (Applause.)
Long live the towering genius of all humanity, the teacher^^1^^ and guide who is leading us victoriously to communism, our beloved Comrade Stalin! (Ovation. All rise. Loud cheers of "Long live our great Stalin!")
390
__ALPHA_LVL1__
L. BERIA
Comrades, our glorious Bolshevik Party has come to its Eighteenth- Congress strong, united, monolithic, rallied closely around its great leader---Comrade Stalin. (Prolonged applause.)
In his report Comrade Stalin summarized the historic victories of socialism in our country and outlined the course for our further victorious advance towards communism.
The Bolshevik Party and all the peoples of the Soviet Union may justly pride themselves on the victories that have been achieved under the wise leadership of Comrade Stalin.
Our country has become mighty, prosperous and cultured. Our people are leading a free, happy and joyous life.
For the first time in the history of mankind, a new society has been built in which the exploiting classes have been wiped out, the exploitation of man by man has been done aw'ay with .and the working people have become the sole masters of the entire material and cultural wealth of the land.
Freed from oppression and exploitation, subjection and poverty, the people have disclosed the creative fbrces latent within them. They have brought forth dauntless heroes who are performing remarkable feats to the glory of their fatherland.
, There has been a tempestuous growth of Soviet culture, a genuine people's culture. During the years of Soviet rule a vast army of intellectuals has arisen from the depths of the working class and the peasantry, an army that is successfully mastering the fundamentals of the great teachings of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin, and that is making bold progress in all fields of science and technology, art and literature.
391Accorded every attention and consideration by the Party and the Soviet state, our intellectuals---flesh and blood of the working people of our country---are imbued with ardent feelings of Soviet patriotism, of boundless devotion to the cause of Lenin and Stalin.
The Stakhanov movement, which developed on the basis of new and up-to-date technique, has upset the old standards of output and raised the productivity of socialist labour to a higher level. The Bolshevik Party has raised* and trained large forces of Party functionaries, government officials and business executives who are supremely devoted to the Party of Lenin and Stalin and who are successfully mastering the art of Bolshevik leadership.
With the unanimous support of the entire population, the Bolshevik Party, undeviatimgly pursuing Comrade Stalin's wise counsel about increasing revolutionary vigilance, has destroyed the main enemy nests of Trotskyite-Bukharinite and other wreckers, diversionists, assassins and agents of foreign espionage services.
As a result of the victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R., a moral and political unity of the Soviet people unprecedented in history has arisen, and the Stalinist friendship between all the peoples of the U.S.S.R. has become closer.
The Stalin Constitution of victorious socialism has still further increased the political activity and social-mindedness of the masses of working people, has still further consolidated Soviet rule.
The Soviet Union has become a mighty socialist power.
It was our wise leader, Comrade Stalin, wjho led our country to these victories. (Prolonged applause.)
It is with justifiable pride ihat the Bolshevik Party and all the working people of our country call all our victories Stalinist victories. (Stormy applause.)
While the Land of the Soviets is undeviatingly and victoriously advancing to new achievements in economic and cultural fields, in the capitalist countries poverty and unemployment are increasing, the crisis of the capitalist system! is becoming more and more serious.
Our Bolshevik Congress is outlining and discussing the gre,at plans for further socialist construction, for still further raising the material and cultural level of the masses of the working people. In capitalist countries, however, the rulers of bourgeois states are directing all their efforts towards unleashing a destructive imperialist war.
The leaders of the capitalist states,^gathering in Munich and Paris, London and Rome, are weaving the net of a new predatory war for 392 the redivision of the world, coming to terms about the prospective victims of fascist aggression, deceiving one another and betraying the interests of the people.
Entangled in internal and external contradictions, capitalism is seeking a way out through a further offensive against the vital interests of the working people, through increased exploitation and through war.
For over two and a half years the joint forces of the Italo-German fascist interventionists, with the support of the so-called democratic states---Britain and France---have been torturing the heroic Spanish people.
For almost two years the imperialist beaSt of prey---Japan---with the condonement of other capitalist states, has been trying to enslave the great Chinese people and deprive them of their independence and freedom.
The struggle of the Chinese people against Japanese imperialism for their freedom and independence will serve as an instructive lesson and grim warning to all imperialist vultures who in the heat of their predatory ventures discount the great power of the people.
In their heroic struggle the Chinese people are overcoming the national disunity of the past, forced on them by the feudal-militarist generals, are uniting in a mighty invincible force and dealing the enemy crushing blows, thereby disrupting the plans not only of Japanese but also of world imperialism.
The admiration and sympathy of the entire Soviet people, of the working people of the whole world, are with the liberty-loving, heroic Chinese people.
To the diplomatic deals and machinations of the bourgeois fascist governments is opposed the Stalin policy of peace, which is being steadfastly and undeviatingly pursued by our Soviet state.
The peace policy of the U.S.S.R. exposes the designs of the imperialist states, thwarts their plans, evokirig furious wrath and hatred on the part of the ruling classes of the capitalist countries for the Soviet Union. The provocations of the enemies come to nought when they encounter the strength and might of our Soviet state.
Our socialist fatherland is guarded by the invincible Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, the Red Navy, our glorious air force, our Soviet intelligence service. (Prolonged applause.}
The lesson of Hassan should be a memorable one not only for the Japanese generals, but for all the aggressors of the so-called antiComintern bloc.
393Comrades, we have achieved great victories in all fields of socialist economy and culture, but the tasks which face us are no less great.
The fulfilment of the historic task set before our Party and our country by Comrade Stalin---to overtake and outstrip the foremost capitalist countries of Europe and America economically as well within the next ten to fifteen years---requires that we not only mobilize all our forces and knowledge, but that we take into account and correct the mistakes that have occurred in our work and the shortcomings in it.
It is well known that the enemies of the people, the TrotskyiteBukharinite wreckers, diversionists, agents of foreign espionage services who wormed their way into our Party, state and economic bodies have done no little damage. But it would be erroneous to attribute the instances of failure in the work of various links of our national economy solely to the disruptive activity of the enemies. To a certain extent these failures must be attributed to poor and defective work on the part of a number of our state and economic executives who have not yet sufficiently assimilated the style of Bolshevik leadership.
In criticizing the work of certain People's Commissariats, Comrade Stalin said at the Seventeenth Congress of the Party:
``Problems are solved, but not a thought is given to supervising the fulfilment -of decisions, to calling to order those who disobey the instructions and the orders of the leading bodies, and to promoting honest and conscientious workers.''
Instead of providing definite and effectual solutions of questions, certain of our economic People's Commissariats and especially their various departments call all sorts of conferences which are not always necessary, often summoning large numbers of people from the provinces. Questions to be discussed at the conferences are not properly prepared for, the conferences themselves are long drawn out, and the comrades who have been called together are obliged to spend days and weeks in Moscow. The fulfilment of the decisions and resolutions of the conferences are not followed up by anyone, and in many cases they are pigeon-holed by the leaders of economic organizations for months and consigned to oblivion. Certain of the People's Commissariats issue an enormous number of orders and instructions, but do not organize any effective check-up on their fulfilment. Therefore it often happens that a number of orders of identical nature or even of a contradictory nature are issued on one and the same question. Thus, for instance, the People's Commissariat of Agriculture of the U.S.S.R. 394 issued over 1,500 orders and instructions in the course of 1938 alone, excluding orders with regard to appointments and transfers, and the People's Commissariat of Water Transport issued 900 orders.
In view of such an, I would say, irresponsible attitude on the part of certain leaders of economic People's Commissariats and their departments towards their own orders and instructions, these documents lose all force and authority, are violated and ignored with impunity-.
All this is to a considerable extent explained by the fact that these comrades do not sufficiently study and enter into the work entrusted to them, do not know their forces well and are not in close touch with the local organizations.
We must draw all the necessary conclusions from what Comrade Stalin has said in his report at our Congress concerning a conscientious study of the work assigned, concerning a study and correct allocation of forces, concerning the bold advancement of tried young workers who are devoted to the Party and the Soviet power, concerning effectual and concrete leadership, concerning direct contact and closer connections between the leadership and the local organizations.
Our country has all the prerequisites for fulfilling the great program of the Stalinist Third Five-Year Plan, but we must firmly bear in mind the wise directives of Comrade Stalin that: "... Victory never comes by itself---it has to be dragged by the hand." "... success depends on the manner in which the work is organized, on the organization of the struggle for the application of the line of the Party, on the proper selection of workers, on supervising the fulfilment of the decisions of the leading bodies.''
The pre-Congress discussion of the theses of Comrade Molotov's report on the Third Five-Year Plan for the development of the national economy of the U.S.S.R. has shown that the Soviet people unanimously approve of the Stalinist line of our Party for the further development of the socialist economy and culture of our country, an.d that they are prepared to fight for the fulfilment of this plan.
In his report Comrade Stalin has brilliantly expounded the increasingly important part played by the Soviet state in fulfilling the further great plans for the building of communism, in the matter of further consolidating the military might of our country, which is surrounded by a capitalist world.
The great service rendered by Comrade Stalin consists in the fact that he not only upheld the Marxist-Leninist thesis on the state in the struggle against the worst enemies of Leninism---the 395 Trotskyite-Bukharinite traitors---but that he has also developed it further in the new historical conditions of victorious socialist construction in our country, which is encircled toy capitalist states.
The contemptible Bukharinites, who came out with the counterrevolutionary theory of spontaneity and deliberately glossed over the decisive, organizing role of the Soviet state, and the ``Lefts'' of all shades with their anti-Leninist theory on the withering away of the state of the working class through the gradual weakening of its role--- served one and the same counter-revolutionary aim of restoring capitalism in our country by weakening the Soviet state.
Dealing devastating blows against the enemies of the people, Comrade Stalin exposed and demolished the enemy postulates on questions of the Soviet state, and with the foresight of genius outlined the tasks connected with the strengthening of the dictatorship of the proletariat.
``A strong and powerful dictatorship of the proletariat---•" said Comrade Stalin at the Joint Plenum of the Central Cdmmittee and Central Control Commission of the C.P.S.U.(B.) in January 1933, "that is what we must now have in order to shatter the last remnants of -the dying classes and to frustrate their thieving designs.
``... The state will wither away not by the weakening of state authority, but by strengthening it to the utmost necessary for the purpose of finally crushing the remnants of the dying classes and for organizing defence against the capitalist encirclement, which is far from being destroyed as yet, arid will not soon be destroyed.''
We must not forget for a moment the wise directives of Comrade Stalin to the effect that our Soviet state must be strengthened-to the utmost. The strengthening of all links of the Soviet state apparatus with tried, staunch forces, the expulsion from this apparatus of all covert and as yet unexposed enemies of the people are tasks of prime importance.
In his speech Comrade Stalin emphasized the fact that 'our Soviet intelligence service plays no small role in the system of our state.
The Soviet intelligence service was founded on the initiative of Lenin and Stalin; it strengthened and developed under the leadership of the Bolshevik Party, of the Stalinist Central .Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
The organs of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs have 396 extremely responsible tasks in connection with the further victorious advance of our country along the path to communism, for our country is living and developing in an encirclement of hostile capitalist states which send to us spies, diversionists and assassins. The vile enemies of the people will in future strive even miore frenziedly to carry on their wrecking activities, to injure us, to hamper the fulfilment of the further program of building communism.
The personnel of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, accorded every attention and consideration by the Party and the people, boundlessly devoted to our Party, to the Stalinist Central Committee of the G.P.S.U. (B.), to our own beloved leader, Comrade Stalin, having purged their ranks of hostile elements that wormed their way into them and having strengthened their ranks with tried forces, will ensure the exposure, defeat and uprooting of all enemies of the people. (Prolonged applause.)
Our invincible Communist, Bolshevik Party, led by our wise and great leader, Comrade Stalin, is the organizer of the victory of socialism in our country.
All the victories we have achieved, all the changes that have taken place in the political, economic and cultural life of our country are reflected as in a mirror in the life of our Party, in its growth and consolidation.
Comrade Stalin has explained to us the significance of the changes that are being introduced into the Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.) in accordance with the changes that have taken place in the class structure of our society as a result of the abolition of the exploiting classes, with the moral and political unity of the Soviet people, which consists of the mutually friendly working class, peasantry and intellectuals, who are equally faithful to the cause of communism, imbued with a feeling of Soviet patriotism and boundlessly devoted to their socialist fatherland.
Comrade Stalin's report at our Congress, which brilliantly elucidated questions of international politics and the course of the victory of communism in our country in the conditions of capitalist encirclement, the questions of the further development and consolidation of the Soviet state and the methods of raising, properly allocating and providing Communist training for Party, state and economic forces, forces of Soviet intellectuals, constitutes a great contribution to the ideological treasury of Marxism-Leninism, a program of action for our whole Party, for the entire Soviet people. (Stormy applause.)
In carrying out the directives of Comrade Stalin, our Party will 397 continue to strengthen its indissoluble bond with the broad masses of the working people; the peoples of the Soviet Union will rally still closer around the banner of Lenin and Stalin, will still further consolidate their Stalinist friendship, which is the foundation of the might and invincibility of the Soviet state.
Let it be known to the enemies that our great Soviet Union is unassailable, that our heroic Workers' and Peasants' Red Armyt enjoying Stalinist solicitude, is invincible and is becoming stronger and developing with every day, that our people are invincible, constituting together with their army a united indissoluble and formidable force, ready to smash and destroy any enemy who dares to encroach on the happiness and freedom of the Soviet people, on the sacred borders of our socialist fatherland.
The historic directives of Comrade Stalin and the decisions of the Eighteenth Congress of the C P.S.U. (B.) will be carried out by our Party, which has been nurtured by Lenin and Stalin and steeled in the battles for socialism, by our people, who are closely rallied around the Bolshevik Party, for our Party and our people are being led from victory to victory by that greatest genius of mankind---our Stalin. (Stormy applause. All rise. Shouts of "Long live the Soviet intelligence service, hurrah!")
398
__ALPHA_LVL1__
N. SHVERNIK
Comrades, in his report Comrade Stalin has given us an exceptionally profound and powerful picture of the .heroic struggle of the Bolshevik Party since the Seventeenth Congress for the new victories of socialism in our country.
Comrade Stalin's report is not only a brilliant analysis of the path that has been traversed, but is also a militant program of action for the achievement of new successes in the struggle for the triumph of communism.
For the victories of socialism we are indebted to the LeninistStalinist Central Committee of our Party, whose political line and practical work for the given period has been correct, has been the line of Lenin and Stalin, the line of struggle for the triumph of the socialist system in our country. (Applause.)
For all our successes we are indebted to the man who is leading us from victory to victory---to that great leader and teacher, Comrade Stalin. (Stormy, prolonged applause.)
The victorious fulfilment of the Stalinist Second Five-Year Plan has not only strengthened the economic might of our country, but has also led to a new improvement in the material and cultural conditions of the working people. The increased material well-being is reflected in the first place in the steady rise in the wages of the workers and other employees.
The national payroll has increased from 34,953,000,000 rubles in 1933 to 96,425,000,000 rubles in 1938, and the average annual wage for this same period has more than doubled.
The policy of our Party with regard to wages has been directed 399 Emacs-File-stamp: "/home/ysverdlov/leninist.biz/en/1939/LSTT487/20100304/487.tx" __EMAIL__ webmaster@leninist.biz __OCR__ ABBYY 6 Professional (2010.03.06) __WHERE_PAGE_NUMBERS__ bottom __FOOTNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [*]+ __ENDNOTE_MARKER_STYLE__ [0-9]+ towards stimulating labour productivity, towards abolishing indiscriminate equalization in the wages paid for skilled and unskilled work, towards abolishing levelling in the wage scales of the various branches of industry, so that the highest wage scale should be assured the leading branches of industry, like the coal-mining industry, the metallurgical industry, the defence industry, the machine-- building industry and other industries of decisive importance in strengthening the economic and defensive might of the Soviet Union. And, under the leadership of the Central Committee of our Party and the Soviet Government, this task has been successfully carried out.
At the end of 1937 the following industries advanced to first place with respect to the level of wages: the oil extraction industry, in which the average monthly wage of workers and other employees increased from 130 rubles in 1932 to 307 rubles in 1937; the coal mining industry in which there was a corresponding increase from 120 rubles to 302 rubles; the metal working industry---from 141 rubles to 282 rubles; the iron and steel industry---from 132 rubles to 275 rubles, etc. The wages of workers in the leading trades have risen correspondingly. The daily earnings of a pneumatic drill operator in the Donbas coal fields increased from 12 rubles 72 kopeks in 1934 to 29 rubles 63 kopeks in 1938; the daily earnings of a coal-cutting machine operator increased from 12 rubles 96 kopeks to 29 rubles 17 kopeks; the daily earnings o'f a smelter in the iron and steel industry increased from 19 rubles 11 kopeks to 28 rubles 42 kopeks; of a senior roller from 18 rubles 62 kopeks to 32 rubles 73 kopeks.
Allow me to cite several figures on the increase in the earnings and labour productivity of individual workers. Take, for instance, Comrade Rybakov, a Stakhanovite smelter of the Kirov Steel Mill in Makeyevka. In 1925, working as second helper, he earned only 80 rubles a month; in 1930, working as first helper, he was already earning 150 rubles, in 1934---400 rubles, in 1938---650 rubles, and in January 1939 he earned 740 rubles. Together with the increase in labour productivity the earnings of the workers have risen.
In 1930, 35-40 tons of steel per shift were smelted per open hearth furnace. This was considered the limit, and many people said that it was out of the question to go any further. Actually, however, the Stakhanovites, developing Stakhanov methods of work, surpassed this limit, and in 1935, 45 tons of steel was already being smelted in an open hearth furnace; in 1938 this same furnace was smelting 65 tons, and some days as much as 80 tons. The furnace was the very same, no alterations whatever having been made. Comrade Rybakov asserts 400 that all that is required are a few rationalization measures, the redesigning of the ladle so that it can hold more metal, and then it is possible to smelt more steel in the very same furnace.
Let us take another example of the increase in wages and labour productivity. Comrade Bessedin, a coal-cutting machine operator in the Melnikov Mine in Lysichansk, began to work in the mine in 1928 as a digger. At present he is a Stakhanovite. Here is what Comrade Bessedin says about the increase in his wages and labour productivity. In August 1935 he carried out his quota 214 per cent, in November 286 per cent, in December 270 per cent, during which time his earnings varied between one thousand and one and a half thousand rubles per month.
In January 1936, at a conference that was called in his branch of industry to discuss the question of raising the technical standards of output, Comrade Bessedin undertook to cut 52 meters on a foreign short-bar coal-cutting machine. At present he is working on a Sovietmade coal-cutting machine and exceeding his quota by 400-600 per cent.. (Applause.) The quota for a coal-cutting machine is 3,000 tons, he cuts 13,000 tons. (Applause.), His earnings amount to from 3,500 rubles to 4,000 rubles a month, and his average monthly earnings for 1938 amounted to 3,549 rubles. (Applause.)
And it is not only in heavy industry that we have such a rise in wages and labour productivity. The same is true of light industry also. Comrade Anna Ivanovna Korbukova began work as a bobbin girl in the Dzerzhinsky Textile Mill (in Leningrad) in 1931. She worked as a bobbin girl for six months and then began to work as a weaver. For the first few months she worked on twelve looms, not even fulfilling her quota, as she herself declares, and then she got the hang of her work and began to fulfil her quota. After a while she began to work on eighteen looms, and in about half a year she went over to twenty-two looms and soon to twenty-seven looms. Now she is working on twenty-seven looms and fulfilling her quota 110 per cent, with no spoilage.
When she began to work in the mill in 1931 she received only 140 to 150 rubles a month. Then, when she started working as a weaver, she began to receive 200 ruble's. Now she is earning 500 to 550 rubles a month. Comrade Korbukova is a second-year student at the Industrial Academy, where she is studying after working hours.
These facts testify that our forces, by mastering technique, are raising labour productivity, and that on this basis their earnings are rising.
__PRINTERS_P_401_COMMENT__ 26-263 401Under the leadership of the Party, the trade unions will continue to fight in future for carrying out the program for increasing labour productivity as provided by the Stalinist Third Five-Year Plan.
Our task is to establish such wage rates as will ensure the abolition of equalization in payment for skilled and unskilled work, for light and difficult work, as will stimulate the proper organization of work, the constant increase in labour productivity, and on this basis the further improvement of the material conditions of the workers and other employees.
Our workers, foremen, technicians, engineers and inventors are displaying more and more initiative, in introducing rationalization proposals. The participants in the socialist rationalization movement are directing their efforts towards improving the work of our enterprises, towards perfecting machines, machine tools and the technical aspect of production.
I shall cite only a few examples which show the great importance of the rationalization proposals of workers when they are not pigeonholed by the economic organs, but are put into effect. The Gorbunov Factory effected an economy of over ten million rubles in 1938 through the introduction of 5,500 workers' rationalization proposals; the "Krasny Bogatyr" Factory effected an economy of over 6,000,000 rubles during the last five years through the introduction of only part of the rationalization proposals made by workers and engineers.
The Moscow Electric Lamp Factory, which introduced only half the rationalization proposals made by the workers, effected an economy of over 5,000,000 rubles.
The organization of the initiative displayed by the workers, technicians and engineers with regard to rationalization proposals must become one of the means in the struggle of the economic and trade union organizations for improving the organization of work, for further increasing the productivity of labour, for strengthening labour discipline and inculcating a socialist attitude towards labour, towards production, in the masses of workers and other employees.
The victorious fulfilment of the Stalinist Second Five-Year Plan has clearly shown that only in our country, where the workers are the masters of production and know that the fruits of their labour go for the welfare of the whole of society, for the welfare of the entire people, for strengthening the economic and defence powers of the socialist state, can creative initiative constantly grow and develop.
And there is no doubt whatever but that our splendid working class is capable of displaying such labour productivity as will ensure the 402 carrying out of the task of overtaking and outstripping the most developed capitalist countries of Europe and the United States of America economically as well. A guarantee of this is the fact that we are building communism under the guidance of our Bolshevik Party, under the guidance of our leader and teacher---Comrade Stalin. ( Applause.)
The fact that the appropriations of the Soviet state for social insurance are increasing from year to year is also evidence of the improving material conditions of the working class. During the Second FiveYear Plan period expenditures from the state social insurance budget amounted to 32,500,000,000 rubles as against 10,400,000,000 rubles for the First Five-Year Plan period, in other words, a more than threefold increase.
An increasing number of workers and other employees are being sent to rest homes, sanatoriums and health resorts by the trade, unions every year. At the end of the First-Five-Year Plan period the trade unions had only 94 sanatoriums, accommodating 170,000 people annually, whereas at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan we already had 230 sanatoriums, with accommodations for 320,000 people annually. At the end of the First Five-Year Plan period me trade unions had only 305 rest homes, accommodating 1,200,000 people annually,whereas at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period the trade unions had 621 rest homes, accommodating 1,800,000 people annually. During the Second Five-Year Plan period, 6,807,000 people vacationed in rest homes, and 1,579,000 people underwent treatment in sanatoriums and health resorts.
New forms of rest and recreation are becoming more and more popular among the working people. From 1936 to 1938, 356,000 workers and other employees spent their vacations in a lively and edifying manner by travelling---through the Crimea, the Caucasus, along the Volga, through the Ukraine and in other places of the Soviet Union; during this period 3,577,000 people participated in out-of-town excursions organized by the trade unions.
' During the Second Five-Year Plan period, the trade unions spent over 1,100,000,000 rubles on services for children, counting only the expenditures from the state social insurance budget, as against 258,000,000 rubles during the First Five-Year Plan period, that is, almost four times as much.
During the Second Five-Year Plan period, 244,000,000 rubles were spent on Pioneer camps, as against 4,000,000 rubles during the period of the First Five-Year Plan, that is, 61 times as much. In 1937 and __PRINTERS_P_403_COMMENT__ 26* 403 1938, over 2,500,000 children spent their vacations in Pioneer camps.
Only in. our country is it possible for the millions of workers and other employees to vacation in well-appointed rest homes and to take cures in sanatoriums and health resorts. Only in our country are the upbringing and health of children accorded constant attention. In no other country in the world is this the case, nor can it be the case so long as capitalist slavery and oppression continue to exist in those countries, for capitalism and solicitude for the individual are incompatible with each other.
Genuine solicitude for the individual exists only in our country, in the country of victorious socialism, where the matter of greatest importance to the Party, to the Soviet Government and to Comrade Stalin personally, is constant care for people, for their well-being and happiness. (Applause.)
The expansion of our national economy since the Seventeenth Congress of the Party has been accompanied by an increase in the number of workers and other employees. The number of .workers and other employees in our socialist national economy has increased from 22,000,000 to 28,000,000. During this time, the number of trade union members has increased from 19,000,000 to 23,800,000.
The constant growth in the number of workers and other employees, their increased organization, the rise in their cultural level and political activitjr, all demanded a constant improvement in the work of the trade union organizations.
In his report Comrade Stalin said:
``... the Party came to the conclusion that the best way to make it easier for the Party bodies to guide the organizations and to make the leadership itself concrete, alive and practical was to divide up the organizations, to reduce their size.''
On the initiative of Comrade Stalin, and under the leadership of the Central Committee of the Party, the trade unions have also divided up their organizations into smaller units. At the time of the Seventeenth Congress of the Party, we had 47 trade unions, now we have 168.
The purpose of this division into smaller units was to enable the trade union organizations to se^ve the workers and other employees better and to strengthen the concrete guidance given to the factory committees. Experience in the work of the trade unions that have been divided up in this way shows that they have begun to give more concrete guidance to the lower trade union organizations, and to 404 serve the workers and other employees better. Thus, the directive of the Central Committee of our Party with regard to the division of the trade unions has wholly and fully justified itself.
The Sixth Plenum of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions was a turning point and marked a decisive stage in the reorganization of the work of our trade unions. The decisions of the Sixth Plenum of the A.U.C.C.T.U. were drawn up with the closest participation of Comrade Stalin and Comrades Kaganovich and Andreyev. Comrade Stalin disclosed the existence of a peculiar sort of crisis in the trade unions, the essence of which consisted in the fact that the leading trade union organizations, not having made clear to themselves the nature of the new situation and their new tasks, lagged behind the great sweep of socialist construction and lost contact with the trade union membership, whose cultural level and political activity had risen to unprecedented heights.
The trade union bodies violated democracy, failed to report on their work to the trade union membership, substituted co-option and appointments for elections. The Central Committee of the Party pointed out to the trade unions that unless they overcame these gross shortcomings in their work, they would not be able to carry out their tasks in the new conditions.
These directives of the Central Committee of the Party were adopted by the trade unions as a militant program of action. In carrying them out, the trade unions organized reports and elections of all trade union bodies, from top to bottom, on the basis of the broadest development of democracy and of Bolshevik criticism and self-- criticism. During the elections the remnants of Tomsky's bandit gang, the Trotskyite-Bukharinite spies and diversionists who tried to corrupt the trade unions, to minimize their role and significance in the struggle for socialism, striving to drive 'our trade unions into the blind alley of their counter-revolutionary brand of trade-unionism, were exposed and driven out of the trade union apparatus.
New people entered the trade union leadership, people with creative initiative who were able to base their work on the activity of the broad masses. The composition of the trade union committees in factories and other establishments was changed to the extent of 70 to 80 per cent, and the Central Committees to the extent of 96 per cent. The working class advanced "people who were outstanding in socialist production, who were active social workers, to trade union posts. Among the members of the trade union committees of factories and other establishments, 80 per cent are non-Party, 26 per cent 405 women, and 26 per cent Stakhanovites. Among the members of shop trade union committees, 83 per cent are non-Party, 19 per cent women, and 39 per cent Stakhanovites. Among the chairmen of trade union groups 93 per cent are non-Party, 28 per cent women, and 38 per cent Stakhanovites.
The trade union organizations have drawn over 5,000,000 people into active trade union.work, an increase of 2,000,000 over 1934. This 5,000,000 strong army of the trade union active is working in all fields of trade union work---as insurance delegates, as members of social insurance councils, as voluntary labour inspectors, members of labour protection commissions, members of commissions that organize socialist competition, etc., and of wage commissions, members of commissions on housing and living conditions, and as members of the brigades exercising public control over the work of restaurants, buffets, shops and stores, etc.
Unfortunately time does not permit me to dwell in detail on the enormous amount of work that is being carried out by these 5,000,000 active trade unionists. By actively participating in trade union work, millions of people are developing their organizational abilities, going through the first school of social work among the masses. Among them, comrades, are many people who show examples of how mass work should be conducted. This enormous army of trade union activists constitutes a splendid reserve from which forces can be drawn for promotion to the executive bodies of our socialist national economy.
Under the leadership of the Party, closer contact has been established between the trade union bodies and the masses. The trade union organizations have begun to participate actively in socialist construction.
Comrade Stalin teaches<us that the trade unions
``. . . constitute a school of communism. They promote from their midst the best people to carry out leading work in all branches of administration. They form the link between the advanced and the backward elements in the ranks of the working class. They unite the masses of the workers with their vanguard.''
The role of the Soviet trade unions as schools of communism is now becoming even greater.
Our country has entered upon the phase of completing the building of classless, socialist society and the gradual transition from socialism to communism.
406In these conditions the work of educating the masses in the spirit of communism is of decisive importance.
What are the practical tasks of the trade unions in these conditions?
The trade unions must carry on still more propaganda to popularize the tasks of socialist construction, the great Plan of the Stalinist third five-year period, explaining all the complexities of the international situation in which we find ourselves.
It is necessary to develop socialist competition and the Stakhanov movement to the utmost, to make the leadership of the socialist competition and Stakhanov movements more effectual, to give publicity to obligations undertaken by participants in socialist competition and to the results of their fulfilment. The work of production conferences must be improved. Production conferences must become schools for teaching efficient management in enterprises, schools for teaching Stakhanov methods of work.
The trade union organizations must intensify their work of improving socialist labour discipline in our industries and offices on the basis of the strictest observance of the order of the Council of People's Commissars of the U.S.S.R., of the C.C. of the C.P.S.U.(B.), and of the A.U.G.C.T.U., of December 28, 1938, which is of enormous economic and political importance.
Our entire mass political work among the trade union membership must be raised to a new level. Mass political work in the trade unions must ensure a further rise in the cultural level of the workers and other employees, an increase in their political activities in all fields of public and civic life of the country, a further flourishing of socialist patriotism.
It is primarily up to the clubs, Red Corners and other cultural establishments to discharge this most important task, and in this connection their work must be radically improved.
During these years there has been an enormous rise in the cultural level of the working people. The following data on the work of the libraries, circles and schools organized by the clubs and Red Corners alone testify to this fact. In just the trade union libraries having more than ai thousand books each, the number of subscribers has increased from 4,670,000 in 1934, to 6,343,000 in 1938. Each subscriber to these libraries has read an average of 18 books in 1938, as against 13 books in 1934.
The number of workers and other employees who are members of various circles---political,, general educational, defence, dramatic, 407 singing, etc.----has increased from 4,730,000 in 1935 to 6,573,000 in 1938, that is, by over 1,800,000.
During this time---from 1933 to 1938---the trade unions have taught over 5,000,000 illiterate and semi-literate people.
However, we cannot rest content with these results. Irrespective of the progress that has been made in the various branches of work, the trade unions are still far from wielding organizational and political influence over all the workers and other employees. About 4,000,000 workers and other employees still remain outside the trade unions, are not trade union members. And during the Third Five-Year Plan period, millions of new people will enter our industries. They will require of the trade unions not only organizational, but also great educational work.
There is no doubt about the fact that the Soviet trade unions will carry out the tasks which stand before them, with the help and under the leadership of our Party.
Comrades, when the plenum of our Party announced the convocation of the Eighteenth Congress, the working people met this information with a new wave of socialist competition. The workers, collective farmers and Soviet intellectuals greeted the opening of the Eighteenth Congress of the Party with new achievements in production.
Comrade Stalin's historic report has given rise to a mighty new wave of creative initiative and labour enthusiasm in our socialist factories and mills, in the mines and pits, and in the broad expanses of the collective-farm fields.
There is no doubt that the working people of our socialist country will also greet the decisions of our Party Congress with a feeling of joy, with a unanimous striving to discharge all the tasks set by the Congress.
Nor can it be otherwise.
Comrade Stalin's report and the plan for the third five-year period, which the Congress will approve, have given every builder of socialism a graphic picture of the great flowering of our fatherland, of its further material and cultural progress.
Every day of struggle and construction will still further enhance the greatness of our socialist fatherland in the eyes of the working class of capitalist countries, will strengthen in them the belief in the possibility and inevitability of victory over capitalism throughout the world.
The Soviet trade unions, faithful to the invincible banner of Lenin 408 and Stalin, will continue to be devoted assistants of the Bolshevik Party in the fulfilment of the new historic tasks which stand before our country.
The Soviet trade unions will do all in their power to strengthen the international ties of the working class of all countries. Despite all obstacles put in their way by leaders of the trade unions of capitalist countries, the Soviet trade unions on their part will do all that is possible to establish the unity of the international trade union movement for the struggle against war and its instigator---fascism.
Long live our heroic working class!
Long live our Bolshevik Party I
Long live the inspirer and organizer of the victories of socialism, our great leader and teacher, our own beloved (Comrade Stalin! (Stormy applause. All rise.)
409 __ALPHA_LVL1__ RESOLUTIONS __ALPHA_LVL2__ RESOLUTION OF THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESSHaving heard and discussed the report of Comrade Stalin on the work of the C.C. of the C.P.S.U.(B.), the Eighteenth-Congress of the C.P.S.U.(B.) resolves:
1. That the political line and the practical work of the C.C. of the C.P.S.U.(B.) be approved.
2. That the report of Comrade Stalin be approved and all Party organizations be instructed to be guided in their work by the principles and tasks set forth in Comrade Stalin's report.
March 14, 1939
410 __ALPHA_LVL2__ RESOLUTION OF THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESSResolved that the report of the Central Auditing Commission be adopted.
March 14, 1939
__--_--_--__ __ALPHA_LVL2__ RESOLUTION OF THE EIGHTEENTH CONGRESSHaving heard and discussed the report of the Delegation of the C.P.S.U. (B.) in the Communist International, the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.-) approves the political line and the practical work of the said Delegation.
March 14, 1939
__--_--_--__ 411 __ALPHA_LVL2__ THE THIRD FIVE-YEAR PLAN FOR THE1. As the result of the successful fulfilment of the Second FiveYear Plan (1933-1937), the fundamental historical task set by this Plan has been accomplished in the U.S.S.R.: all exploiting classes have been abolished finally, and the causes which give rise to the exploitation of man by man and the division of society into exploiters and exploited have been completely done away with. One of the most difficult problems of the socialist revolution has been solved: the collectivization of agriculture is completed, the consolidation of the collective farm system is an irrevocable fact. In our country "the first phase of communism, socialism, has, in the main, been realized" (Stalin). The new Constitution of the U.S.S.R. is the legislative embodiment of the victory of socialism.
At the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period, 98.7 per cent of our country's productive capital, of its means of production and its buildings for production purposes, were socialist property, the property of the state, and of the cooperatives and collective farms. The socialist system of production has come to exercise undivided rule in the whole national economy of the U.S.S.R.: it comprised 99.8 per cent of the gross production of industry, 98.6 per cent of the gross 412 output of agriculture, including the personally owned subsidiary establishments of the collective farmers, and 100 per cent of the" volume of trade.
The class structure of Soviet society has changed in accordance with the socialist reconstruction of the economy of the country. In 1937 the workers and employees engaged in the socialist economy of the U.S.S.R. represented 34.7 per cent of the total population of the country; the collective-farm peasantry, together with the handicraftsmen organized in cooperatives, represented 55.5 per cent; the armed forces, students, pensioners and others---4.2 per cent. Thus, even at that time 94.4 per cent of the population of the country was employed in socialist economy or closely bound up with it. The rest of the population: individual farmers, and handicraftsmen and artisans not organized in cooperatives, represented only 5.6 per cent of the population. This section of the population has diminished still further since then.
Socialist society in the U.S.S.R. is composed at the present time of two mutually friendly classes: workers and peasants, and between these classes as well as between them and the intelligentsia, the lines of demarcation are being effaced, are gradually disappearing. The overwhelming majority of the people in the U.S.S.R. are active and conscious builders of classless, socialist society, of communism. The victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. has achieved an inner moral and political unity of the people hitherto unprecedented anywhere, a moral and political unity of the mass of the working people under the banner and under the leadership of the Communist Party and the Soviet government. This unity not only is capable of putting an end to the remnants of the hostile classes, with their alien influences, and of defeating all hostile attacks from without, but also forms the best guarantee of the further growth and prosperity of our fatherland, a guarantee of the victory of communism in our country.
2. The chief and decisive economic'task of the Second Five-Year Plan, the completion of the technical reconstruction of the national economy of the U.S.S.R., was essentially accomplished.
The country's technical apparatus of production was renewed in thoroughgoing fashion. In 1937 over 80 per cent of the total output of industry was supplied by new establishments built or entirely reconstructed during the First and Second Five-Year Plan periods; about 90 per cent of all tractors and harvester combines employed in agriculture were manufactured by Soviet industry during the Second Five-Year Plan period. Industry and transportation completed their 413 share of the Second Five-Year Plan ahead of schedule. In industry the Second "Five-Year Plan had been fulfilled by April 1, 1937, or in four years and three months, during which period heavy industry expanded at an especially rapid rate. The Second Five-Year Plan for railway transportation was overfulfilled in four years. The most important tasks set by the Second Five-Year Plan for agricultural output, namely, the production of grain and cotton, were also exceeded.
In comparison with 1932, the last year of the First Five-Year Plan period, industrial production had increased in 1937 by 120.6 per cent, the scheduled increase for the Second Five-Year Plan having been 114 per cent. During the Second Five-Year Plan period, the average annual rate of growth of industrial output was 17.1 per cent as compared with 16.5 per cent specified by the Plan.
Production personnel trained for all branches of the national economy of the U.S.S.R. is successfully mastering the new technique. One of the greatest victories of the Second Five-Year Plan was the training of large forces of Soviet intellectual workers so necessary for all branches of socialist construction, and the extensive promotion to executive positions in every branch of the national economy of persons taken from the ranks of the Party and non-Party Bolsheviks.
The successes scored in the mastery of the new technique have found striking expression in the Stakhanov movement. The development of socialist emulation, and of its highest form, the Stakhanov movement, has led to a great advance in the productivity of labour in industry and the other branches of the national economy. During the Second Five-Year Plan period, labour productivity in industry increased 82 per cent, as compared with the 63 per cent specified in the Plan. In the same period the productivity of labour in the building industry increased 83 per cent, as compared with the 75 per cent specified in the Plan. The advance of the Stakhanov movement, and the numerous magnificent examples of socialist-- conscious work set by the Stakhanovite workers with their high records of labour productivity, have created the conditions necessary for a fundamental improvement of labour discipline in all our factories and offices. This is an indispensable prerequisite of high labour productivity by all working people, and the guarantee of a fresh powerful stride toward communism in the U.S.S.R.
In order to ensure the fulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan, it was necessary to organize the struggle against the remnants of the 414 hostile class elements, against the hostile class influences in the country's economic, cultural and political life. For this purpose it was necessary above all to organize the struggle for the safeguarding and consolidation of socialist, that is, state and collective-farm, property against thieves and embezzlers, against all and sundry accomplices of the class enemy, and especially against such traitors to the people as the Trotskyite-Bukharinite and bourgeois-nationalist spies, diversionists and other wreckers, who have locked hands with foreign espionage services, have become the agents of fascist secret police services. Their traitorous work has caused serious damage in a number of departments of the country's national economy. The rout of these bands of spies and wreckers has cleared the way for further and even greater successes in the socialist economy of our country.
3. The task set by the Second Five-Year Plan of improving the material conditions and raising the cultural level of the working people, at the same time increasing national consumption 100 per cent and over, was also fulfilled.
The number of workers and employees in all branches of the national economy increased 17.6 per cent during the Second Five-Year Plan period. The average yearly wages of workers and employees for "the whole of the national economy had increased 113.5 per cent, that is, had more than doubled, in 1937 as compared with 1932. The national payroll of the workers and employees rose 151 per cent instead of the 55 per cent rise scheduled in the Second Five-Year Plan, that is, it increased to two and a half times as much. The state expenditure on cultural and other public-welfare services for workers and employees in town and country (out of the ail-Union, Republican and local budgets) on education, public health, physical culture and social maintenance, as well as the expenditure on state social insurance, rose from 8,300,000,000 rubles in 1932 to 30,800,000,000 rubles in 1937, an increase of 270 per cent.
.Besides this, the state expended 16,300,000,000 rubles during the years of the Second Five-Year Plan on improving the housing and other living conditions of the people, as well as on municipal services. The well-being of the collective farmers increased considerably during this period. Total incomes of the collective farmers rose more than 170 per cent in four years (1934-37), and the cash incomes they received for their work-day-units rose 350 per cent during these years.
In 1937 the output of articles of mass consumption was more than double that of 1932. In a number of important products and 415 manufactures for mass consumption, the output was not only doubled but trebled. State and cooperative trade mdre than trebled during the years of the Second Five-Year Plan, and, if collective-farm sales are included, rose from 47,800,000,000 rubles in 1932 to 143,700,000,000 rubles in 1937. The non-fulfilment of the tasks set in the Second FiveYear Plan with regard to the reduction of retail prices of articles of mass consumption was more than compensated by an increase in the wages of workers and employees far above the increase provided for in the Plan, and by the considerable increase in the cash incomes of the collective farms and their members.
A veritable cultural revolution was accomplished in the U.S.S.R. during the Second Five-Year Plan period. The attendance at the elementary and secondary schools rose from 21,300,000 to 29,400,000. The number of children in the fifth, sixth and seventh grades doubled, and in the eighth, ninth and tenth grades increased fifteen times. The number of students in the universities and colleges increased to 550,000. Cultural progress can be recorded in all other departments of life.
Considerable success was achieved by all the Union Republics of the U.S.S.R. in the field of industrialization and in the raising of the material and cultural level of the population, in the training of Bolshevik personnel from among the nationalities of the respective republics, and in the advancement of national culture, socialist in content. The peoples of the Soviet East made especially rapid strides in their material and cultural development.
4. As a result of the victory achieved in the fulfilment of the Second Five-Year Plan, and the successes scored by socialism, the Soviet Union has entered in the Third Five-Year Plan period .upon a new era of development, the era of the completion of the building of classless, socialist society, and of the gradual transition from socialism to communism. In this era the communist education of the people, and the overcoming of the survivals of capitalism in their minds, in the minds of the builders of communism, assume decisive importance.
The difficulties attending the fulfilment of this stupendous task must not, however, be underrated, especially not in view of the hostile capitalist encirclement of the U.S.S.R. The more so because, in spite of the successful fulfilment of the First and Second Five-Year Plans, in spite of the record rates of development achieved by our industry, in spite of the fact that in production technique Soviet industry has surpassed the foremost capitalist countries, we have not yet caught up with them economically.
416The U.S.S.R. has become transformed into an economically independent country that provides all technical equipment needed by its national economy and national defence. In speed of development its industry holds first place in the world. While industry in the capitalist countries, after the severe economic crisis which set in at the end of 1929, could hardly reach 102.5 per cent of the 1929 level in 1937, and, beginning with the second half of that year, once more experienced a sharp drop under the blows of a new: crisis, the industry of the U.S.S.R. had expanded in 1937 to 428 per cent of the 1929 level, representing a more than eight-fold increase in industrial output as compared with the pre-war figure. In 1938 the output of industry in the U.S.S.R. increased by another 11.3 per cent as compared with the previous year, reaching 477 per cent of the level of 1929, while in thfe capitalist countries industrial production shrank 13.5 per cent in 1938 as compared with the previous year, falling off to 90 per cent of the level of 1929.
While in the capitalist world, where development has been extremely uneven in the different countries, there has been no growth of industry on the whole during the last ten years, but rather a noticeable decline in its output, in the Soviet Union we have had a steady and rapid expansion of industry with industrial production growing at a rapid rate from year to year. However, by reason of the fact that in the past our country was extremely backward economically, the level of development of industry in the U.S.S.R., in point of output per head of the population, is even now considerably lower than in the technically and economically most developed capitalist countries of Europe or in the United .States. It is a well-knowln fact that in our country a considerably smaller amount of industrial products falls to each member of the population than in such countries as the United States, Britain, Germany or France.
For instance, if we compare per capita production at the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period, taking the U.S.S.R. as the basis of comparison, we arrive at the following results: electric power--- France produced more than twice as much as the U.S.S.R., Britain not quite three times as much, Germany three and a half times as much and the U.S.A. five and a half times as much; pig iron---Britain and France each produced more than twice as much as the U.S.S.R., Germany two and a half times as much and the U.S.A. three times as much; steel---France produced not quite twice as much as the U.S.S.R., Britain and Germany each not quite three times as much, and the U.S.A. not quite four times as much; coal---France produced __PRINTERS_P_417_COMMENT__ 27---263 417 somewhat more, and the U.S.A., Britain and Germany each considerably more than the U.S.S.R.
The U.S.S.R. is still behind in the per capita production of such manufactures as textiles, paper, soap, and some others.
This inadequacy of industrial production in the U.S.S.R., as compared with the technically and economically most advanced capitalist countries, must be completely overcome, in order to assure the ultimate victory of communism in its historic contest with capitalism.
5. Now that the U.S.S.R. has constituted itself a socialist state, has completed in its essentials the technical reconstruction of the national economy, and is in advance of any capitalist country of Europe with respect to level of technique of production in industry and agriculture---now we can .and must squarely face and carry out in actual practice the fundamental economic task of the U.S.S.R.: to overtake and surpass the most advanced capitalist countries of Europe and also the United States of America economically as well, and to accomplish this task once and for all in the immediate future.
This requires a further considerable increase in the technical equipment of every branch of the national economy, and, consequently, a maximum development of machine building and of all heavy industry, a decided improvement in the whole organization and technology of production, accompanied by an extensive application of the latest achievements of science and invention. It further necessitates a numerical and, particularly, a qualitative increase in trained production personnel, and a thorough mastery of technique in indus • try, transportation and agriculture. Following Lenin's tenet that "the productivity of labour is, in the final analysis, the most important, the chief thing, for the victory of the new social system," we must ensure the utmost development of socialist emulation and the Stakhanov movement, a steady improvement of labour discipline in all factories and offices and on all collective farms, and a degree of labour productivity for workers, peasants and intellectuals that is worthy of socialist society.
At the same time national income and trade must grow sufficiently, to enable the national consumption to increase 50-100 per cent during the years of the Third Five-Year Plan. To this end, we must, in addition to effecting a great increase in the output of the heavy and defence industries, also augment the manufacture of articles of mass consumption and foodstuffs, and make possible a corresponding increase in real wages of workers and employees, and in incomes of collective farmers.
418In accordance with these fundamental tasks of the Third FiveYear Plan, a considerable rise in the cultural level of the whole mass of the working people in town and country must be achieved, and a great step forward must be taken in the historical task of raising the cultural and technical level of the working class, the most advanced and the guiding force of socialist society, to the level of engineers and technicians.
The gigantic growth of industry and of the country's entire economy under the Third Five-Year Plan, and the necessity of ensuring its further unhampered progress in line with this national plan, particularly now that the aggressive forces of imperialism in the countries surrounding the U.S.S.R. are on the increase, demand the formation of large state reserves, primarily in the field of fuel and electric power, in some branches of the defence industry and for the development of the transportation system. This requires proper distribution over the various regions of the country, the elimination of unproductive and long-haul shipments, and maximum local sources of supply for the chief economic centres of the country.
The Eighteenth Party Congress of the C.P.-S.U. (B.) approves the assignment of the following tasks in the Third Five-Year Plan for the national-economic development of the U.S.S.R., which has been submitted by the State Planning Commission of the U.S.S.R. and adopted by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and the Council of People's Commissars of the U.S.S.R.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ II. Plan of Increase In Output During the Third1. The total volume of output of industry in the U.S.S.R. in 1942, the last year of the Third Five-Year Plan period, is fixed at 184,000,000,000 rubles (in 1926-27 prices), as compared with 95,500,000',000 rubles in 1937, equivalent to a 92 per cent increase in industrial production during this period.
The average annual rate of growth of industrial production as a whole in the U.S.S.R. during the Third Five-Year Plan period is fixed at 14 per cent, the average annual increase in the production of means of production being set at 15.7 per cent, and in the production of articles of consumption at 11.5 per cent.
__PRINTERS_P_419_COMMENT__ 27* 4192. The volume of output of key industries for the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period, that is, for 1942, is set as follows:
Unit of measurement
19421942 m per cent of 1937
All industry (1926-27 prices) ..... ...
mill. rbls.
184,000
Of which:
Production of means of production . . .
Production of articles of consumption . ,
Machine-building and metal-working
industries (1926-27 prices)
n n
» »
114,600
69,600
63,000
207
172
Main line locomotives (in ``E'' and "SU'>
equivalents) ... . . ... . .
unit
2,340
Freight cars (in two-axle equivalents) . . .
Automobiles ...............
thous .
120
400
203
200
Electric power
mill, kwh .
75 ,.000
Coal ...
mill, tons
Crude oil with gas . . . . .
. 64
Peat ..............
49 206Pig iron .................
22 152Steel .............. ....
28 158Rolled steel
21 162Of which: Special steels ........... .
6 199 Chemicals (1926-27 prices)-
mill. rbls.
14,000
Cement . . ...
mill, tons
Merchant-timber hauled . .
200 180Sawmill products ...........
45 166 Paper ........ ..........
thous . tons
1,600
Cotton fabrics ..............
mill, metre
4,900
Woolen fabrics . .
177 167 Leather footwear .......
mill, pairs
Granulated sugar ...........
thous. tons
3,600
Canned goods (People's Commissariats of
the Food, the Fish and the Meat
Industries) ........ . •.
mill, cans
1,800
Structural shapes ........ . .
thous. tons
3. Machine building, the industry which occupies the key position in the technical equipment of the national economy, is to be developed.in every way so as to ensure the application of modern technique to all branches of the national economy and to all arms of the service, so as to meet the present-day requirements of the state. The output of the machine-building industry is to be increased 130 per 420 cent during the Third Five-Year Plan period, that is, considerably more than the growth of industry as a whole. The production of every kind of machine tool must be ensured, with a decided increase in the proportion of high efficiency and special machine tools, particularly of automatics and semi-automatics. The output of metalworking machine tools is to be increased to 70,000 in 1942 as compared with 36,000 in 1937, the number of models of machine-tools being increased to 800'. Everything must be done to restore and modernize worn-out machine tools. The output of tools, especially standardized tools, must be doubled, while the output of pneumatic, electrical and other kinds of power hand tools is also to be increased.
The comparative lag in the manufacture of power machinery behind the constantly growing demand's of the country must be overcome. The manufacture of steam turbines is to be increased 490 per cent and that of steam boilers 420 per cent, comparing 1942 with , 1937. The manufacture of medium and small power turbines of 12,000 kw. or less is to be greatly expanded, and the proportion of these motors in the total output increased. The production of powerful hydraulic turbines for the Kuibyshev hydro-electric development must be mastered.
Special attention must be paid to increasing the output of portable steam engines, stationary and marine Diesel engines, particularly of high-speed engines, and also of gas engines. All motor machinery in lumber camps and a considerable part of the tractors used in agriculture as well as of automobiles are to be changed to gas-- generating types.
The lag in the production of building and road-making machinery and appliances as well as of builders' tools must be overcome. The manufacture of excavators, suction dredges and hydraulic apparatus must be increased to the utmost.
The output of complicated apparatus and equipment for the chemical industry is to be expedited, so as to fully ensure the powerful growth of this industry. We must master the production of new, technically perfected, high-speed types of spinning and weaving machinery, of looms and of equipment for knit-goods and other textile mills and for shoe factories, paying particular attention to machinery by which entire production processes are rendered automatic. We must overcome the backward state of spinning machinery manufacturing by a six-fold increase in the production of ring spindles (in the plants of the People's Commissariat of General Machinery). The 421 manufacture of machinery for the food industry, particularly of bottling and packing machinery, is to be further developed. The sea and ocean-going fleet must be enlarged by the addition of modern vessels of every description, and the capacity of shipyards increased to an extent sufficient to ensure the domestic building'of all sea and river craft required by the growing water transportation systems of the U.S.S.R. We must extend the production of automatic and remote control apparatus. Production of equipment for the iron and steel industry is likewise to be enlarged, as is that of equipment for the mechanization of laborious processes, such as moving cranes, and loading and unloading apparatus.
4. The coal and oil industries must be greatly expanded, as they constitute the fuel base for the* whole economic development of the country. Coal mining is to be developed to the level necessary to meet all current requirements of the country and to ensure the accumulation of reserves by economic organizations and the state.'The highest possible speed of output is to be achieved in the coal districts of the Urals, in the Moscow coal basin, in the Far East and in Central Asia. Coal mining in these regions is to be increased as follows in the Third Five-Year Plan period: in the Urals 210 per cent,-in the Moscow coal basin 270 per cent, in the Far East 170 per cent, and in Central Asia 340 per cent. iDuring this period the output of lignite is to be increased 160 per cent. New plant is to be provided for the exploitation of local coal deposits in all regions of the country where even small deposits exist and, as they develop, locally mined fuel must replace the longhaul fuel now used by local industry, municipal services, schools, hospitals and offices. The comprehensive mechanization of coal mining is to be completed in all the coal districts of the country, and the coal mining processes are to be organized on the basis of the introduction in all coal fields of production cycle time schedules, on which the high labour productivity of the Stakhanovite miners is based.
A new oil field, the "Second Baku," is to be opened and developed in the region between the Volga and the Urals. The fulfilment of the program of oil extraction and refining is to be achieved by the rapid prospecting of the region and the introduction of efficient equipment in all branches of the oil industry.
We must widely apply turbine-driven drilling, pressure drilling, the closed method of oil extraction by which the gas is made to yield the benzine it contains, and must also make extensive use of chemical methods in the refining of oil. The output of fuel of high octane 422 number and of high quality oils must be forced with all energy. A system of oil pipe lines and of oil supply.bases must be established, especially in the eastern districts of the U.S.S.R.
We must develop the cutting of peat for local use, especially in the Ivanovo and similar regions, so as to curtail long-haul coal shipments. Peat briquette and dehydrated peat manufacturing, and the quarrying and utilization of shales must be developed in every way.
Wide use must be made of the gasification of every kind of fuel, and of the subterranean gasification of coal. Subterranean coal gasification is to be made an independent branch of industry during the Third Five-Year Plan period. The output of gas from oil and gas deposits and from the subterranean gasification of coal is to be increased 250 per cent during this period. A number of plants for subterranean gasification of coal are to be built and put into operation in the Donetz and Moscow coal fields, and in the East of the U.S.S.R. The gas produced is to be used to generate power, and supply the chemical industry and the municipal services. In big cities, primarily Moscow and Leningrad, wood as a heating medium is to-be replaced by gas heating, and, where local fuel is available, by steam heating. The utilization of coke and blast-furnace gases is to be developed by laying a system of gas mains, in the first place in the Donetz Basin.
An industry is to be established, in the East in particular, for the production of synthetic liquid fuel by the hydrogenation of hard fuel, and also for the synthetic production of liquid fuel from gas.
5. In the field of electric power development, the disproportion which now exists in various respects between the rapid growth of industry and the insufficient increase in the capacity of the electric .power stations is to be removed, so that power plant capacity increase will not only exceed the growth of industry, but ensure the accumulation of considerable capacity reserves. In accordance with this, the total capacity of power stations is to be increased during the Five-Year Plan period by 110 per cent. In steam power station development, we must change to the building of small and medium size plants for 25,000 kilowatts and less. The penchant for huge power stations, and the consequent neglect of small and medium stations, must be condemned as wrong and detrimental to the economic interests of the state. The capacity of regional steam power stations is to be specially approved by the government in every case. We must introduce on a large scale the modern technique of energetics, high pressure and super-heated steam, modern turbines for central heat-and-power 423 plants, and automatic machinery for the main production processes at the power stations and for the operation of the wires.
It is of the utmost importance that all establishments, whether they belong to industry, the municipal utilities, transportation or agriculture, must economize in the use of fuel and electric power.
6. The chemical industry is to be converted into a leading branch of manufacture, capable of satisfying completely the needs of the national economy and the national defence. The Third Five-Year Plan is a five-year plan stressing chemical products. The Party Congress resolves that the output of the chemical industry be increased 140 per cent, that is, considerably more than industry as a whole. The output of sulphuric and nitric acid, synthetic ammonia, artificial fibre and composition material is to be greatly increased. New branches of the synthetic manufacture of organic products ( synthetic alcohol, acetic acid, etc.), are to be created by utilizing the by-- products of oil refining, and the production of rubber, coke and natural gases. In all branches of the chemical industry we must effect strict adherence to technological principles and the steady introduction of the latest scientific achievements: the intensification of chemical production, the change from periodic to permanent processes, the use of high pressures and the development of electro-chemical methods. Laborious work must be mechanized and an advance made in the introduction of automatic machinery.
7. A steady marked increase in output is to be achieved in the iron and steel industry, which in many respects determines the growth of all industry and of the national economy as a whole, and the increase in the production capacity of which therefore requires particular and constant attention. The Third Five-Year Plan is a fiveyear plan laying stress on special steels. The Congress resolves that the output of special rolled steel be doubled and that the manufacture of special steels---hard alloys, stainless, acid and heat resistant steels, tool, precision-instrument and transformer steels, and also ferro-alloys---be sharply increased. The smelting of charcoal pig iron from sulphur-free and phosphorus-free ores is to be developed on a large scale. We must do away with the specialization of rolling mills, the handiwork of the wreckers, which necessitates cross and long-haul shipments of metal, and must see to it that all the principal iron and steel producing centres of the country have locally produced rolled steel of all generally used specifications.
Mtetal rolling without ingots must be established on an industrial scale, and oxygen blast for smelting furnaces must be widely 424 introduced. A second source of production and supply of dynamo transformer iron must be established. We must also master the smelting in open-hearth furnaces of ball-bearing and other kinds of highgrade steels and extend the use of this process. Another process to be mastered and widely applied is the production of low-percentage alloyed steels, using in the first place natural alloy pig iron obtained from Khalilovo and other ores. We must develop centrifugal casting in the manufacture of iron and steel tubing. In the Urals and in Siberia manganese ore mining is to be developed to an extent sufficient to warrant the discontinuance of such ore shipments from the South. In the Far East a new iron and steel industry, is to be established, which shall be equipped for a complete iron and steel production cycle so as to be able to supply locally all requirements of the machinery industry. During the Five-Year Plan period the ratio of pig iron smelted in the eastern districts is to increase from 28 per cent to 35 per cent of the country's total.
8. We must increase the output of non-ferrous metals to an extent sufficient to meet the rapidly growing requirements of the national economy and national defence. By 1942 the smelting of black copper is to show an increase of 180 per cent, and of aluminum (inclusive of silumin) not less than 300 per cent compared with 1937. A rapid increase must be achieved in the production of lead, zinc, nickel, tin, magnesium, tungsten, molybdenum and antimony. Substitutes for non-ferrous metals must be extensively used in all branches of machine building. Energetic steps are to be taken to economize nonferrous and ferrous metals by reducing loss in mining, concentration and smelting,' by allowing less metal per unit of manufactured product, making proper use of all forms of waste in the manufacturing industries and getting out special steel for building construction.
Acid and heat-proof enamels for coating ferrous-metal apparatus, thus replacing non-ferrous metals, must -be produced in much greater quantities.
9. We must put an end to the comparatively backward state of the timber industry. All processes in the production of timber must be extensively mechanized, and greater use made of gas generating machines and steam engines. While making full use of the advantages of the winter season for timber-cutting operations, we must at the same time see to it that all-year lumber camps are also established. Lumber yards must be well stocked with air-dried wood. The paper and the wood distillation industries are to be given maximum 425 development, as is the production of alcohol from saw dust and the waste products of paper mills.
10. The output of prefabricated units in the building industry, especially parts made of wood, concrete, reinforced concrete and gypsum plaster, also the output of structural shapes must be increased to the utmost. The rate of growth of output of high-grade cement, of sanitary equipment and of finishing and facing materials as well as of non-metallic minerals, especially of asbestos and asbestos products, must be increased.
11. The Congress resolves that the output of articles of general consumption be increased during the Third Five-Year Plan period by 70 per cent.
In light industry full use must be made of the greater raw material supply to increase the production and assortment of goods, and to improve their quality, at the same time storing up the necessary reserves of raw material. The disproportion in output between the preliminary and the spinning departments must be overcome, as must the lag of spinning behind weaving. The equipment of the entire textile industry, especially of the cotton industry, must be perfected. We must introduce high-speed, one-process scutching machines and other perfected machinery, high-stretch frames, automatic looms and apparatus controlling and regulating technological processes.
The food industry must considerably increase the assortment of its products, particularly of the two highest grades of products. The output of canned milk and of canned vegetables and fruits, of tomato and other juices, of fresh frozen vegetables and fruits, of factorymade ice cream, beer, wine and champagne is also to be increased.
We must take energetic measures to bring the fish industry into line with other industries. Fish catch must be increased in all fisheries, especially at Murmansk and in the Far East. Progress must also be made in the processing and canning of fish. The local organizations must expand to the utmost the fish industry serving their particular region by developing fisheries of local importance (rivers, lakes, ponds).
12. The development of local industry and producers' cooperatives, which are important sources of supply for the growing demands of the working people, must be intensified. As their present rate of growth is to be considered inadequate, we must endeavour at least to double their output during the Third Five-Year Plan period. The selection of goods they produce must be increased and their quality improved (especially in the case of furniture, crockery and other 426 household supplies). Besides increasing the output of articles of general consumption, the principal task of local industry and the producers' cooperatives, we must resolutely expand the production of local fuels and building materials.
We must add greatly to the number of mechanized shoe, clothing, furniture and household goods repair shops, and other similar establishments serving the general public.
13. The plan fixed for the growth of industrial production and the further tasks assigned in the field of mastering the new technique make imperative a considerable increase in labour productivity and a substantial reduction in production costs. The Congress makes the following specifications for the Third Five-Year Plan period:
a) A 65 per cent increase in labour productivity, in industry, which factor alone is to secure an increase of 62,000,000,000 rubles in industrial output in 1942 as compared with 1937.
b) A 10 per cent decrease in the cost of production in industry (in 1937 prices), which is to secure a saving to the state of 20,000,000,000 rubles in 1942 as compared with 1937.
Quality of output must be improved to the utmost in all branches of industry. We must organize a determined struggle against mismanagement, must fight to eliminate idle time and losses in production, and must lower the allowance of raw material supplies, fuel and electric power per unit of output. Production waste and low quality raw materials must be applied to useful purposes on a large scale.
We must properly organize the establishment of standards and norms, and secure their wider application in 'the national economy.
14. The Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.) sets the following increase in the output of agriculture as a whole: from 20,100,000,000 rubles in 1937 (in 1926-27 prices) to 30,500,000,000 rubles in 1942, that is, an increase of 52 per cent. The Congress specifies the following tasks for the most important branches of agriculture:
a) Gram crops: by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period the annual harvest must total 8,000,000,000 poods, or an average yield of 13 centners per hectare.
b) Industrial crop harvests in 1942: sugar beet---282,000,000 centners, yield 235 centners per hectare; raw cotton---32,900,000 centners, yield for irrigated cotton 19 centners per hectare; flax fibre--- 8,500,000 centners, yield 4.6 centners per hectare, with an improvement in the grade of flax.
Hemp yield must be considerably increased. Special attention must be paid to increasing the production of rubber-bearing plants, 427 and of sunflower and other oil-bearing plants, by proper organi^ ation of seed breeding, rational distribution by districts and improve^ ment in farming methods.
c) The natural increase of livestock and the increase in the output of livestock products for the market must be adequate to afford a complete solution of the livestock problem in the U.S.S.R. The number of horses is to increase 35 per cent, cattle 40 per cent, hogs 100 per cent, sheep and goats 110 per cent, with particular attention to the development and consolidation of collective-farm dairy and livestock departments. It is a task of prime importance to raise the productivity of livestock by improving the breed and in general effecting a radical change for the better in pedigreed stock raising, by properly districting breeds, increasing fodder areas and taking better care of the stock.
d) Vegetable and livestock farming must be organized in the vicinity of Moscow, Leningrad, Baku, Kharkov, jKiev, the industrial centres of the Donetz and Kuznetsk Coal basins, Gorky, the cities of the Far East and of all-other big cities, for the purpose of supplying these centres of population in full with potatoes and other vegetables, and to a considerable extent with milk and meat.
ej Choice high-grade and improved seeds, from selection stations as well as of local origin, must be used exclusively in sowing grain and other cereal crops. Proper systems of crop rotation, including provision for grass sowing and bare,fallow, must be introduced on collective farms and state farms, as they add greatly to the fertility of the soil and ensure a rise in yield and a reliable source of fodder for the increasing livestock.
f) We must terminate the neglect into which the work of land improvement has fallen, and must systematize land improvement operations on the collective farms; all work attached thereto is to be financed out of the state budget.
g) During the Third Five-Year Plan period the mechanization of labour processes in all departments of agriculture is to be completed. Trailer-implements required in agriculture must be supplied in full, with due regard to the number and types of tractors to be used. The most advanced principles of agronomy must be widely applied, and the vast practical, experience of the foremost agriculturists must be utilized along scientific lines. Particular attention must be paid to the mechanization of laborious processes of work in stock breeding in state farms and collective-farm dairy and livestock departments. We must widely develop the building of small collective-farm hydro-- 428 electric power plants, and of electric installations using wind-power or gas-generating engines burning local fuel.
The output of machinery and apparatus to combat pests and plant diseases is to be increased.
The building of horse-drawn trailers, particularly for transportation purposes, is also to be developed, and the manufacture of simple grain cleaning machinery is to be extended.
h) The collective farms and state farms must learn to apply correctly organic and mineral fertilizer systems, paying particular attention to the proper storage and use of (manure and other.local fertilizers and to the elimination of waste in the use of mineral fertilizers. The practice of applying lime to siliceous (podzol) soils and gypsum to alkali soils must be widely extended.
i) On the basis of the further mechanization of farming and the increasing productivity of labour, the state farms must be transformed in actual fact into highly efficient and highly remunerative economic units that will serve as models of organization, yield and productivity in farming. The number of head of cattle on the state farms of the People's Commissariat of State Farms must be increased, primarily by introducing stock raising on the state grain farms.
15. The Congress fixes the following increases in freight traffic:- railways---from 355,000,000,000 ton-km. in 1937 to' 510,000,000,000 ton-km. in 1942; river transportation---from 33,000,000,000 ton-km. to 58,000,000,000 ton-km.; mercantile marine---from 37,000,000,000 ton-km. to 51,000,000,000 ton-km. In the transportation system the most important task is more efficient planning of freight shipments so as to reduce long-haul rail shipments, eliminate cross shipments and other uneconomic freights, and further increase the percentage of freight hauled by water craft and trucks.
In the Third-Five-Year Plan period labour productivity is to increase 32 per cent in railway transportation and 38 per cent in waterway transportation. Loading and unloading in railway, waterway and motor transportation are to be mechanized.
16. The Congress assigns the following tasks to the railway transportation system for the Third Five-Year Plan period:
a) The number of locomotives is to be increased by 8,000, of which 1,500 are to be model "F.D.," 4,200 of the condenser type and 1,500 model "J.S." for passenger trains. In the near future the condenser-equipped engine must become the prevailing type of freight locomotive.
b) A total of 225,000 four-axle freight cars and 15,000 passenger 429 cars are to be added to the rolling stock; 300,000 freight cars in use and 4,000 passenger cars are to be provided with automatic coupling, and 200,000 freight cars in use are to be provided with automatic brakes. Locomotive and car repair shop capacity is to be extended, especially on the lines in the Urals, Central Asia, Siberia and the Far East. Shops for the repair of condenser locomotives must be established.
c) The railroad transportation system must be further reconstructed, particularly the tracks. In the Third Five-Year Plan period, 11,000 km. of line must be built and opened for operation, and 8,000 km. of second track laid.
d) Railroad lines totaling 1,840 km. are to be electrified, primarily mountain railways and lines on which freight shipments are particularly heavy; also the larger junctions with heavy suburban traffic. We must introduce on the widest scale the automatic block system, the dispatcher signal system and auto-stop signals.
e) Railroad station facilities and junctions must be expanded, primarily on the lines connecting the Donetz coal basin with Krivoy Rog, Leningrad and Moscow, connecting the eastern districts of the Urals, the Northern territory and the Murmansk region with the central 'part of the U.S.-S.R., and Western Siberia with Central Asia; also on the South-Western, Western and Eastern lines.
17. The Congress sets the following tasks to be accomplished by the waterway, motor and airway transportation systems during the Third Five-Year Plan period:
a) To put am end to the lagging state of water transportation and increase its importance as a public carrier, particularly in the hauling of such bulk shipments as lumber, grain, coal and oil. The condition of the sea-going and river craft must be improved, modern vessels must be added and gas-generating engines installed on river craft. Ship repair yards and seaports must be built on a more extensive scale.
To take broadly-conceived steps to reconstruct and increase the efficiency of the present water routes, to reconstruct the AstrakhanGorky-Rybinsk-Moscow line so that by the end of the Third FiveYear Plan period a deep-draft throtigh-route may be established from Astrakhan to Moscow, no draft at any point of the route to be less than 2.6 metres. We must proceed with the reconstruction of the Volga-'Baltic Sea route. The total length of navigable inland waterways must be increased during the Third Five-Year Plan period from 102,000 km. to 115,000 km. •
During the Third Five-Year Plan period, a scheme for the 430 comprehensive reconstruction of the Volga, Don and Dnieper rivers must be elaborated, preparatory measures must be taken to maintain the level of the Caspian Sea, and the work of uniting the Volga and the Don must be commenced.
By the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period the Northern Sea Route is to become a water thoroughfare for normal navigation offering regular communication with the Far East.
i b) To inaugurate regular motor traffic over automobile highways and freight-congested routes leading to cities, railroad stations and water transport lines. We must establish the necessary automobile repair shops, and increase the building of garages, parking places, and gasoline and service stations. Automobile traffic is to increase 360 per cent during the five-year period. The use of trailers in freight shipments by truck is to be extended as much as possible. We must build or rebuild 210,000 km. of roads, with a much greater proportion of superior tar oil, asphalt concrete and concrete roads than during the Second Five-Year Plan period.
Simultaneously, special care must be taken to maintain the present roads in proper condition by promptly attending to current repairs and necessary renewal of roadbed. ,
c) The civil air fleet is to concentrate its service on the principal state lines and improve the technical equipment of the trunk lines by extending and improving its ground facilities.
18. The Congress emphasizes the need for a great expansion of postal, telephone and telegraph communication, particularly interurban service.
We must complete the establishment of direct telephone connections between Moscow and all Republican, territorial and regional centres, and must supplement th.6 radial system of communication with the junction system between the biggest centres of the U.S.S.R. The plan of supplying telephone service to all district centres, village Soviets, machine and tractor stations and state farms must be carried out to full completion. The number of radios must be increased 130 per cent. In a number of big cities television stations are to be installed.
19. One of the principal conditions for achieving the growth of output envisaged by the Third Five-Year Plan is the training of skilled workers and of technicians and engineers as well as extensive activity to promote the introduction of the latest technique and of scientific organization in industry. The Congress considers it necessary that the Third Five-Year Plan should make provision for:
431a) The development of an extensive system of schools and courses for the training and requalifying of skilled workers, and of masters of socialist craftsmanship.
b) The graduation of 1,400,000 technical workers of various trades, and 600,000 specially trained persons with university or college education.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ III. New Construction and Its Distribution During1. In accordance with the plan of growth of production, the Eighteenth Congress sets the sum total of capital investments in the national economy during the Third Five-Year Plan period at 192,000,000,000 rubles (in current estimate prices), as against 114,700,000,000 rubles during the Second Five-Year Plan period, of which:
a) In industry---111,900,000,000 rubles as against 58,600,000,000 rubles in the Second Five-Year Plan period. Of this sum, 93,900,- 000,000( rubles are to be invested in industry producing means of production as against 49,800,000,000 rubles in the Second FiveYear Plan period, an 89 per cent increase, and 18,000,000,000 rubles in industry producing articles of general consumption, as against 8,800,000,000 rubles in the Second Five-Year Plan period, a 105 per cent increase.
b) In transportation---37,300,000,000 rubles as against 20,700,- 000,000 rubles during the Second Five-Year Plan period, an 80 per cent increase.
c) In agriculture---11,000,000,000 rubles. Of this sum, 5,200,- 000,000 rubles are to be invested in machine and tractor stations, 1,300,000,000 rubles for irrigation and land reclamation and 2,500,000,000 to increase the number of cattle on the state farms. The capital to be invested in agriculture by the collective farms themselves during the Third Five-Year Plan period is to total 24,000,- 000,000 rubles.
2. The Congress specifies that new and reconstructed establishments of a total value of 193,000,000,000 rubles (in current estimate prices) be opened for use during the Third Five-Year Plan period, as compared with 103,000,000,000 rubles during the Second Five-Year Plan period.
The Congress notes that the assigned volume of capital construction and the program of inauguration of new and reconstructed 432 establishments ensure a further great expansion of industrial plant and equipment in the U.S.S.R., and the formation of the necessary reserve capacities in the chief branches of the national economy. Capacity of output is to increase as follows during the Third Five-Year Plan period: electric power plants---from 8,100,000 kw. to 17,200,000 kw.; in the coal industry----80 per cent, bringing the capacity of the mines up to 335,000,000 tons by the end of the said period; iron and steel manufacturing (pig iron) up to 25,000,000 tons; non-ferrous metal industry---copper 140 per cent, aluminum 280 per cent; automobile industry---almost 100 per cent; cotton industry (spindles) 50 per cent.
3. The Congress is of the opinion that in distributing new plant under the Third Five-Year Plan among the various districts of the U.S.S.R., the following considerations must control: We 'must bring the industry nearer to the respective sources of raw material and to the districts consuming their output so as to eliminate uneconomic shipments and shipments over too long distances; furthermore, we must continue the advancement of districts, which were economically backward in the past. Accordingly, the Third Five-Year Plan must contain the following provisions:
a) In the 'main economic districts of the Soviet Union, economic development must proceed on a comprehensive scale. We must organize their fuel supply and the production of commodities like cement, plaster of Paris, chemical fertilizers, glass, and mass production articles of light industry and the food industry in quantities sufficient to meet their requirements. It is of particular importance that big industrial districts, whose dependence on large incqniing freight shipments has become greater with their industrial expansion and the rapid increase in urban population, be ensured local fuel supplies and the local procurement of certain products difficult to transport.
Foods used everywhere in large quantities, such as potatoes and other vegetables, dairy and meat products, flour, confectionery and beer, as well as some manufactured goods of mass consumption, such as fancy goods, products of the needle trades, furniture, bricks and lime, must be produced in sufficient quantity in each republic, territory and region.
Due control must be maintained to enforce the decisions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union ( Bolsheviks) and of the Council of People's Commissars of the U.S.S.R. prohibiting the building of new factories and mills in Mloscow and Leningrad. This prohibition should be extended to Kiev, Kharkov, Rostov-on-Don, Gorky and Sverdlovsk.
__PRINTERS_P_433_COMMENT__ 28-263 433b) In economic centres like the Eastern districts, the Urals and the Volga area, duplicate establishments must be built during the Third Five-Year Plan period in several branches of the machine building, oil refining and chemical industries, to eliminate the element of chance in the supply of various industrial products by plants which are now sole producers.
c) Provision must be made for a more rapid increase in capital investments and the construction of new establishments in the Eastern and Far Eastern districts of the U.S..S.R. We must continue to develop in every way the iron and steel industry in these sections, for which purpose three-fourths of all blast furnaces to be built in the country during the Third Five-Year Plan period must be allocated to the eastern districts.
A great new textile manufacturing district, which is to use cotton grown in Central Asia, must be established in the East of the U.S.S.R. In the Far East rapid rates of development must be prescribed for the coal and cement industries so that they may be able to supply all local demands.
d) The further economic and cultural advancement of the national republics and regions must be isafeguarded, in harmony with the fundamental aims pursued in the distribution of productive forces under the Third Five-Year Plan.
4. The Congress considers it necessary to concentrate on the following construction projects as the most important in the Third Five-Year Plan period:
a) In the machine building industry, whose production program for the Third Five-Year Plan period calls for a rate of growth considerably in excess of that of industry as a whole, the building and putting into operation of new factories, particularly those manufacturing machine-tools and electric power equipment, must be greatly expanded and accelerated. We must complete three heavy machinetool works, a milling machine plant in Gorky and an automatic lathe plant in Kiev. Building operations must be developed on a number of new plants of medium capacity for the production of grinders and gear-cutters, horizontal planers, borers, vertical boring and turning machines and automatic lathes; also on plants producing equipment for forging and press departments. During the Third Five-Year Plan period, 4 steam turbine works are to be built and opened for use---in the Sverdlovsk, Ufa, Novosibirsk and Kaluga,districts. Besides these we are to begin to build a steam turbine works in the Novocherkassk district, and ia hydraulic turbine works in the Kuibyshev district. The 434 steam turbine works require the building and inauguration of boiler works, including one at Orsk, jand of factories manufacturing electric power plant accessories and supplies. The mass production of windpower motors must be organized. The Gorky and Moscow automobile factories must be completed. We must build a light automobile factory and a number of additional automdfoile assembly shops (some of them in the Far East), and must develop the building of truck factories in Siberia and of a number of establishments manufacturing supplies for the automobile industry. We must also build more automobile repair shops. In the East an industry must be set up for the production of agricultural machinery and the assembly and repair of tractors. A textile machinery plant must be built in Kursk and another in Western Siberia. The Saratov ball-bearing plant must be completed and two new ball and roller-bearing plants must be constructed. A paper mill machinery plant must be built. We must begin to build a new locomotive works. Two or three heavy and medium chemical machinery works must also be constructed. We must force the construction now under way of shipyards for the building of sea-- going vessels and ocean liners, and must begin to construct new yards for the building of sea and river craft.
b) In the field of electrification, the Congress considers that the chief part of the building program consists in increasing capacity by building new power plants of small and medium size, and in accelerating the construction of hydro-electric plants. We must develop the construction of the two Kuibyshev hydro-electric power plants, which, with their aggregate capacity of 3,400,000 kw., represent the greatest water power project in the world, and, at the same time provide a solution for the problem of irrigating the arid lands of the TransVolga region so that it may produce stable crops, and for the problem of improving navigation over the Volga and the Kama. We must also begin the Kaluga hydro-electric power plant on the Oka River. The following water power plants, among others, must be completed and opened for operation: the Uglich, the Rybinsk, the two Chirchik, the Kanakir, the Svir No. 2, the Khram, the Niva No. 3 and the Sukhumi. Construction must be begun on the following new water power plants: the Upper Kama, the Mingichaur, the Ust-Kamenogorsk and the Gyumusha plants. We must also build small local water power plants on a vast scale: in the Ural districts, on the Tura, Ufa, Chusovaya, Belaya, Nias and other rivers; also on the Northern Donetz River and elsewhere.
In order to economize fuel, a large number of small wind __PRINTERS_P_435_COMMENT__ 28* 435 powerhouses must be built. Provision must be made for building 102 district steam plants, of which the following are to start operations: the Kurakhovka and Nesvetai plants, several plants in Moscow and Leningrad, and the Chelyabinsk, Sumgait, Komsomolsk, Kiev, Nikolayev, Kirov-on-Chepets, Syzran, Orsk, Karaganda, Krasnoyarsk, Khabarovsk, Kuvassai and- Krasnodar plants, among others. In the Ivanovo district we must build a new steam-power plant.burning peat for the textile industry.
The building of high-tension networks and of substations must be promoted in every way.
The total increase in electric power capacity during the Third Five-Year Plan period is set at 9,000,000 kw., which will create a steady reserve capacity in the industrial districts of 10-15 per cent.
c) In the coal industry, a large number of coal and lignite mines must be sunk. New coal fields must be developed, especially in the Urals, the Tatar and Bashkir Autonomous .Soviet Socialist Republics, Eastern Siberia, the Far East, the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, the Ukrainian, ^the Kirghiz and the Tajik Soviet Socialist Republics. The new pits are to be mainly of medium or small capacity. The sinking operations are to be expedited in every way so that they may be finished as soon as possible. The total capacity of the new coal pits to be sunk during the five-year period is set at 170,000,000 tons, of which 160,000,000 tons are to be worked by the end of the period.
In the oil industry, new refineries representing an aggregate capacity of 15,000,000 tons must be put into operation, in addition to cracking installations representing 4,500,000 tons of additional capacity. The paramount task of the Third Five-Year Plan period is the development of a new rich oil region between the Volga and the Urals. In this area oil refineries of a total capacity of 6,000,000 tons are to be built. The work of prospecting for and industrially surveying new oil fields---between the Volga and the Urals, in Siberia, in the Far East, in the Ukraine, in Central Asia and in the Kazakh S.S.R.---must be expanded.
In the peat and oil s/io/e-industry the necessary increase in capital development must be secured. Provision must be made to build factories for the artificial dehydration of peat, so as to prepare the ground for the abolition of seasonal work in peat cutting. We must build two or three coke works which should also be used for the manufacture of chemical products.
d) In the iron and steel industry the following plants must be completed: The Magnitogorsk plant consisting of 6 blast furnaces and 436 2 blooming mills, the Nizhnetagil and Petrovsk-Zabaikal factories, the Amur, Zaporozhye and Azov steel works, the Krivoy Rog iron and steel mill, the Novomoskovsk sheet-iron works, and Novo-Uralsk and Nikopol tubing mills. We must begin to build new iron and steel mills in the southern regions of the Urals (to use Khalilovo and Bakal ores) and in Eastern Siberia, also a pipe welding mill in the Urals, a tube rolling mill in Siberia and a tube foundry in the central regions. Small plants manufacturing articles for local consumption out of metal scrap and waste must be built in the districts of Central Asia and the Transcaucasus. Not less than 17 agglomeration belts are to be built to improve the preparing of the ore for smelting. In all plants, work consuming much manual labour is to be mechanized and automatic machinery installed on an extensive scale.
In order to improve the quality of the rolled steel, the rolling departments of all plants must be supplied with the necessary finishing equipment. During the Third Five-Year Plan period, a total of 20 blast furnaces must be built and 3 charcoal blast furnaces in the Urals must be reconditioned to resume operations. / We must proceed to sink pits in the district of the Kursk magnetic anomaly which is to become a supplementary supply base, for the iron and steel industry in the central regions, and must take preliminary measures for the building of an iron and steel mill in this district.
The industrial survey of the Ata Su and Karsakpai deposits must be completed.
e) In the non-ferrous metal industry, the Balkhash copper smelting plant and the Middle Ural and Blyava plants must be completed. We must proceed with the construction of the Jezkazgan and the Almalyk copper smelting works, and of lead and zinc works in the Altai region. The Ural aluminum works and the aluminum works in Kandalaksha and the Kuznetsk basin must be opened for operations, while the building of other aluminum works imust be commenced. The Tikhvin alumina works, the Southern Ural and the Northern nickel works are to start operations. We must begin to build a number of new plants for the manufacture of lead, zinc, tin, tungsten and molybdenum. We must put up mills ifor the manufacture of nonferrous rolled products and of bi-metallic products, also for the working down of aluminum and magnesium alloys.
f) In the chemical industry, we must expand operations on the construction of new sulphuric acid works (using primarily the waste gases of the non-ferrous metal industry and of power plants), of 437 fertilizer and soda works, and of synthetic rubber and tire works; 13-15 synthetic rubber, 9 tire-cord and 16 tire works distributed all over the country are to be opened for use. We must build 2 synthetic liquid fuel works, 2 regenerator works, 15 regenerator departments in tire works and 2-3 asbestos products works.
Industrial establishments capable of working up the entire crop of rubber bearing plants are to be built.
g) The shipping of cement from the European part of the U.S.S.R. to the eastern districts and the Central Asian republics must stop. For this purpose medium and small-sized cement works of a total capacity of 4,800,000 tons must be built in the various regions of the Far East, in Siberia, the Kazakh S.S.R., the Central Asian republics, in the Urals and elsewhere.
h) Prospecting must be developed to an extent sufficient to ensure raw material supplies to <all industrial plants now in operation or to be constructed during the Third Five-Year Plan period, and to create in all sections of the U.S.iS.R. reserves of fresh industrial supplies for consumption in subsequent years.
i) In the timber industry we must finish and open for operation the Solikamsk, Kondopoga, Kama, Marii, Krasnoyarsk, Solombalsk, Archangel, Lgov, Komsomolsk and Kotlass cellulose and paper mills and a newsprint mill in the Kirov district. We must expand operations on the following building projects: new cellulose and paper mills, wiood-distillation, plywood and woodworking factories and works for the hydrolysis of wood. Provision must be made for the rapid development of timber cutting in the northern and north-western districts of the European part of the U.S.S.R., in the Urals and in the Far East. Capacity must be increased in the timber sawing and wood-working industry in the north of the European part of the U.S.S.R., in Siberia and in the Far East. Lumber shipments from Siberia to the European part of the U.S.S.R. must cease.
j) In light industry, new cotton mills must be opened for operation in Barnaul, Novosibirsk and in the Kuznetsk basin, while small spinning mills must be built in the old textile districts to eliminate the disproportion between spinning and weaving. We must inaugurate the second section of the Tashkent cotton mill, the spinning mill at Leninakan, the Kiev and Semipalatinsk woolen cloth mills, the rubber soles works at Kalinin and the artificial leather works at Kazan. We must intensify the building of new textile mills in the republics of Central Asia, Western Siberia and the Kazakh S.S.R., as well as the building of a number of new knit-goods and hosiery mills, of 438 small linen goods mills, leather goods works, shoe factories, silk mills, and glass works producing bottles and jars.
k) In the food industry, the following establishments must be completed and opened for operation: the Orsk, Engels, Ulan Ude, Irkutsk, Khabarovsk, Sverdlovsk, Ivanovo, Nalchik, Kuibyshev, Dnepropetrovsk, Voroshilovgrad, Ashkhabad and Stalinabad meat packing plants; and sugar refineries in Elan-Koleno, Zherdyovka, Sovietskoye (Kursk region), Alma Ata, Novo-Troitsk, Gnivan (Vinnitsa region), Shpola (Kiev region) and* also one refinery in the Armenian S.S.R. We must build a number of new alcohol distilleries, butter factories, condensed and dried milk plants, and 'confectionery and tea factories. Medium-sized meat packing plants, sugar refineries, mechanized bakeries, cold storage plants, tobacco factories and soap factories must be built.
The fish industry must increase the number of its sea-going fishing craft and complete the following industrial establishments: fish packing plants at Komsomolsk, Khabarovsk, Moscow and Muinak; cold storage plants at Balkhash, Mangistau, Akhtari, Sovietskaya Gavan (Soviet Haven), Petropavlovsk (Kamchatka) and 20 small cold storage plants in the Far. East; shipyards at Murmansk, Niko!ayevsk-on-Aimir and Petropavlovsk (Kamchatka). Provision must be made for the more speedy development of fishing in the Kamchatka, Okhotsk and Ayansk districts by both the People's Commissariat of the Fish Industry and the respective territorial and regional organizations.
1) With regard to local industry and the producers' cooperatives, we must expand the construction of small industrial establishments consuming local raw materials and fuel.
m) In city development, housing construction must be expanded and public amenities increased in urban and industrial centres. New water supply systems must be built in 50 cities, sewage systems in 45 cities and trolley car lines in 8 cities.
Much more extensive use must be made of gas as a municipal utility. The number of trolley cars must be increased by 2,900, fouraxle cars of the latest design being specified for Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev and other big cities of the U.S.S.R. The development of urban and interurban automobile transportation must be given particular attention: the number of omnibuses must be increased by 27,000, and taxicab and taxi-truck service greatly extended. Trolley-bus service is to be expanded in the big cities---Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev, etc. We must accordingly increase the manufacture of trolley-buses, 439 particularly of the double-deck type, the mass production of which must be organized.
Moscow and Leningrad must be further developed and reconstructed in accordance with the plans that have been adopted. The third subway line in Moscow must be completed.
By the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period we must finish in the main the structural work involved in the erection of the Palace of Soviets.
n) In agriculture, 1,500 machine and tractor stations must be established, part by building new stations and part by dividing up old stations. The necessary repair shops for tractors, combines and other agricultural machinery must be set up. On the state farms cattle sheds and other stabling facilities must be'put up in sufficient quantity to fully ensure proper care of the herds.
All major irrigation and reclamation projects now under way, such as the Vakhsh, Colchis, Nevinnomyskaya Canal and Murgab Oasis developments, must be completed. We must proceed to build the Trans-Volga irrigation system and increase agricultural plant and equipment in the drought districts.
o) Gram elevators and warehouses of a total capacity of over 10,000,000 tons must be added to the existing network, so that before the end of the first half of the Third Five-Year Plan period the storing of grain in sheds will be entirely discontinued.
5) For the purpose of accelerating the construction and inauguration of the new plant and its distribution among the chief economic districts of the country, the Eighteenth Congress of the G.P.S.U.^B.) demands that the mania for building giant factories and works be resolutely combated and that a sweeping change be made in favour of building medium and small-sized establishments in all branches of the national economy of the U.S.S.R. In industrial construction we must prohibit the building of establishments specialized along too narrow lines, and must organize the cooperation of establishments among themselves within their respective economic districts.
The Congress calls attention to the need for the energetic application of express methods in building. These necessitate, the development of the building industry, the strengthening to the utmost of the territorial [local] building organizations, the transformation of the building industry from a relatively backward into a foremost branch of the national economy, into an industry which is mechanized on a comprehensive scale, uses standard parts and sections and has all establishments required for this purpose.
440In order that the program of building operations as outlined in the Plan may be carried into execution, the Congress fixes the increase in labour productivity in the building industry during the Third Five,Year Plan period at 75 per cent and the reduction in production costs of building operations by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period at 12 per cent in comparison with production costs at the end of the preceding five-year period.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ IV. The Plan For the Further Rise in the MaterialThe fulfilment of the First and Second Five-Year Plans denoted not only a great advance in the national economy and its socialist transformation, together with a strengthening of the Soviet Union's power of defence, but also a vast rise in the material and cultural standard of the peoples of the U.S.S.R.
The Third Five-Year .Plan must satisfy to a istill greater extent the wants and desires of the people, their requirements of foodstuffs and manufactured goods, of housing, and cultural and other public services. The fulfilment of the Third Five-Year Plan guarantees, moreover, another big step forward towards the formation of a powerful material basis for the subsequent development of the productive forces, the welfare and culture of socialist society in the UjS.S.R. It is now not a question of abolishing unemployment and of doing away with poverty in the countryside---this we have already accomplished in full and for all time. The task now is to promote the popular welfare and culture until they reach a level in consonance with the growing demands of the Soviet people, a level that: is beyond the scope of possibility for even, the richest capitalist countries, a level that denotes the commencement of real florescence of the forces of socialism, the 'flourishing of a new culture, of socialist culture.
The Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S,U.(B.) sets the following tasks for the Third Five-Year Plan period with regard to improving the material conditions and raising the cultural standard of the working people in town and country:
1. a) National consumption in the U.S.S.R. is to be increased more than fifty per cent in accordance with the expanding incomes of the workers, peasants and employees.
441b) In comparison with 1937, there is to be a 21 per cent increase in the number of workers and employees by the end of the Third Five-Year Plan period in all branches of the national economy, a 37 per cent increase in average wages and a 67 per cent increase in the national payroll.
c) State expenditures on cultural and other public welfare services for the working people of town and country, that is, expenditures on social insurance, education, public health, allowances to mothers of big families and on cultural and other public welfare services for the benefit of workers and employees, exclusive of state appropriations for housing and municipal development, are to total 53,000,000,000 rubles as against 30,800,000,000i rubles in 1937, a more than 70 per cent increase.
d) Incomes of collective farm.ers are to rise considerably as a result of the growth of labour productivity in the collective farms, and of the increasing yield of all crops and of stock raising.
e) A wide compass of measures is to be carried out to effect a substantial advance toward the realization of the historic task of raising the cultural and technical level of the working class of the U.S.S.R. to the level of engineers and technicians.
f) Universal secondary education is to be carried into effect in the cities, while in the countryside and in all national republics the introduction of universal seven-year secondary education is to be completed and the number of children receiving a ten-year schooling it to increase. In consequence the attendance at elementary and secondary schools in cities and workers' settlements is to rise from 8,600,000 to 12,400,000, and in rural localities from 20,800,000 to 27,700,000.
g) The number of students at the universities and technical colleges is to rise to 650,000, with attention during the next few years fixed mainly on improving the quality of the higher education imparted.
h) The number of moving picture theatres, clubs, libraries, houses of culture and reading rooms is to be increased; there is to be a sixfold increase in premises equipped for sound films and portable sound-film projectors.
i) There is to be a considerable expansion of the public health service and improvement in the hospital service. We must enlarge the scope of sanitary preventive measures, promote maternity aid, increase children's hospital accommodations, improve labour protection and provide the working people with greater facilities for sports 442 and recreation. State appropriations for public health are to increase from 10,300,000,000 rubles in 1937 to 16,500,000,000 rubles in 1942. Accommodations in permanent nurseries and kindergartens are to increase from 1,800,000 rubles in 1937 to 4,200,000 rubles in 1942.
j) Housing construction in cities and workers' settlements is to be developed energetically; 35,000,000 square metres of new housing space are to be opened for occupancy during the Third Five-Year Plan period.
2) For the purpose of improving the living conditions of the people, the Third Five-Year Plan period must witness a maximum development of Soviet trade, which is to> jbe conducted 'along efficient lines. Accordingly, it is specified:
a) That the volume of state and cooperative trade increase by 1942 to 206,000,000,000 rubles, as against 126,000,000,000 rubles in 1937, including a 100 per cent increase in the volume of business done by public dining rooms, restaurants, cafes and buffets.
b) That the number of retail trade establishments be increased 38 per cent, and that the trading organizations be provided with improved facilities in the line of cold-storage, wholesale stores and warehouses, cartage and delivery of merchandise. In rapidly growing rural districts there is to be a particularly great increase in the number of stores and stands dealing in commodities of everyday use and in supplies for repairs and for building purposes in urgent demand by the peasants.
3) The Congress fixes an 80 per cent increase in the national income for the Third Five-Year Plan period. In connection herewith the Congress establishes that the rising incomes of the population and of the state are absolutely sufficient to cover both the people's requirements---the national consumption----and the state's requirements for the development of the national economy, the strengthening of the country's power of defence and the formation of the necessary state reserves.
The tremendous advance of all branches of the national economy demands that all work of national-economic planning and of the organization of accounting be further improved. The main object in rearranging the work of planning is to keep an organized check on the carrying out of plans so as to prevent any disproportion arising among the several branches of the national economy, and to discover new reserves for the fulfilment of the Plan; also to introduce corrections in the plans of individual branches of economy and of individual districts so as to bring them into accord with actual plan fulfilment.
443The Congress stresses the necessity of improving the work of- the budget and credit systems, of the stricter application of cost accounting, of combating mismanagement with greater energy, of increasing the returns from heavy industry and other branches of the national economy, of strengthening the Soviet ruble on the basis of socialist production, of an intensified development of trade, and a general improvement in the standard of living of the people.
__*_*_*__In order that the tasks prescribed by the Third Five- Year Plan may be carried out without fail, the Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.) demands of all Party, Soviet, economic and trade union organizations:
a. Live, concrete direction, efficient leadership in economic matters, those in leading positions to concentrate on the proper selection of staffs, on an actual daily check up on how tasks assigned by the Party and the Government are being carried out.
b. A proper system of wages for workers, foremen, engineers and technicians, designed to provide a material incentive for increasing labour productivity.
c. The development of socialist emulation and the Stakhanov movement, the enforcement in factories and offices of strict labour discipline and the securing of high labour productivity by all those employed.
In collective farm development, the tasks to be accomplished are the further strengthening of the agricultural artel in every way, both organizationally and economically: the public property of the collective farms must be developed and consolidated, the collective-farm livestock departments, and the common buildings, common emergency stores and other forms of collective property must be expanded, as this is the basis for a further advance in agriculture and the further rise in the material and cultural standards of the collectivefarm peasantry. In this connection it is necessary to fight with greater determination against violations of the Rules of the Agricultural Artel. We must not permit any increase beyond the limits allowed by law of the subsidiary establishments personally owned by the collective farmers, or of the plots of land attached to their dwelling houses for their personal use, or of the number of cattle of the individual collective farmers, as such increases lead to an infringement of the interests of the collective farm concerned and prevent the establishment of firm collective-farm discipline. It is essential to have 444 still better discipline on the collective farms and to intensify the necessary educational work among the entire mass of the collective farmers, to increase the productivity of labour, to encourage the most efficient collective farmers, and to introduce extensively the system of working in teams on the collective farms. In the interests of still better discipline and greater labour productivity, and of larger per capita incomes on the collective farms, and for the purpose of further developing industry, increasing the supply of commodities in the country and the influx of workers from the collective farms to the industrial establishments, the collective farms must be prevailed upon systematically to release members for work at industrial establishments, primarily those who are little employed in collective farm work, have few work-day-units to their credit and are thus an undue burden on the collective farm.
The realization of the tasks of the Third Five-Year Plan makes it imperative that the after-effects of the counter-revolutionary wrecking activities of the Trotskyite-Bukharinite spies and agents of fascism and of foreign capital be completely wiped out and that Bolshevik vigilance be increased in the whole work of building communism. We must ever be mindful of the injunction of the Party that as long as we are surrounded by capitalist countries, the espionage services of foreign states will manage to send wreckers, diversionists, spies and assassins into our midst to damage, harm and weaken our country, to prevent the growth of communism in the U.S.S.R.
Whether or not we reach the great objectives set by the Third Five-Year Plan, so closely intertwined with the vital interests of the workers, peasants and intellectuals, depends chiefly on us, the leaders, the Communists and non-Party Bolsheviks, particularly on our ability to organize work and to improve the communist education of the people. All of us, leaders and rank-and-file workers, employees and collective farmers, are required above all to be socially-minded with regard to our duties, to work honestly and to aid those lagging in the rear so that the Third Five-Year Plan may prove a success, so that the Soviet Union may take a new giant stride along the road leading to the complete triumph of communism.
Under present-day conditions, when in the U.S.S.R. the socialist forms of economy, socialist property and the socialist organization of work hold undivided sway, when communist consciousness on the job, of which our state, our people and all the labouring masses are the beneficiaries, acquires paramount importance in deciding the success of our cause, the role of the Soviet intelligentsia, which has 445 learned to work in Bolshevik fashion, to fight like Bolsheviks for greater culture and communist consciousness among the people, assumes enormous proportions. Today when the political and economic positions held by socialist society in the U.S.S.R. have been finally consolidated, the decisive factor is personnel, trained workers who have become masters of their respective crafts, the decisive factor is the Soviet cultural workers who head the mass of the working people in their great struggle for the complete triumph of communism.
In the capitalist countries the vitals of society are being gnawed deeper and deeper by a new economic crisis which throws upon the streets ever new millions of unemployed and increases the poverty and despair of the masses engaged in involuntary toil for capital. In the camp of capitalism it is the fascist countries that call the tune, the fascist countries whose rule of blood and terror at home and policy of imperialist aggression abroad have already led to a second imperialist war in which a number of countries of Europe and Asia are taking part, and which threatens to spread further. These are all indisputable signs of the intensification of the general and irremediable crisis of capitalism, of the parasitic decay of capitalism and its approaching collapse. So much the greater is our obligation to do our duty, our duty as builders of the first socialist society which has already, succeeded once and for all in standing on its own feet politically and economically, a society full of vigour and confidence in its victory, a society which begets courage in the hearts of the labouring masses of all countries and imbues them with the firm belief that their liberation is nigh. The fulfilment of the Third FiveYear Plan will be the best testimonial of the all-conquering power of communism in its historic competitive struggle with capitalism.
It is the demand of the Eighteenth Congress of the C.P.S.U. (B.) that every Bolshevik, every builder of communism devoted to the cause, do all in his power to rally the workers, collective farmers and intellectuals still more closely around the banner of the Party of Lenin and Stalin in the struggle for the success of the Third FiveYear Plan.
March 20, 1939
446 __ALPHA_LVL2__ AMENDMENTS TO THE RULES OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.)1. The victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. has ensured the dominance of the socialist economic system. The class composition of the .population of the U.S.S.R. has changed in conformity with the profound changes in the economic sphere. All exploiting elements---- capitalists, merchants, kulaks and profiteers---have been eliminated in the period of socialist construction. The working people of the U.S.S.R.----the workers, peasants and intellectuals---have undergone profound change in the period of socialist construction.
The working class has radically changed. It has been transformed into an entirely new class, a class emancipated from exploitation; it has abolished the capitalist economic system and .has established the socialist ownership of the means of production.
The peasantry has radically changed. It has been transformed into an entirely new peasantry, a peasantry emancipated from all exploitation. In its overwhelming majority, it consists of collective farm peasants, who base their work and wealth not on private farming, individual labour and backward technique, but on collective property, collective labour and modern technique.
The intelligentsia has changed, having for the most part become an entirely new intelligentsia, bound by all its fibres with the working class and the peasantry. The Soviet intelligentsia consists of yesterday's workers and peasants, and sons of workers and peasants, who have been promoted to commanding posts. The Soviet intelligentsia does not serve capitalism, as the old intelligentsia did, but socialism, and is an equal member of socialist society.
Thus the class boundaries dividing the working people of the 447 U.S.S.R. are being obliterated; the economic and political contradictions between workers, peasants and intellectuals are disappearing---- becoming obliterated. A basis for the moral and political unity of Soviet society has been formed. This moral and political unity of the Soviet people has been brilliantly confirmed in the creation of the Communist and non-Party bloc in the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the U.S.S.R. and the Supreme Soviets of the Union Republics and in the complete victory of this bloc. A numerous body of non-Party Bolsheviks has grown up around the Party, consisting of advanced workers, peasants and intellectuals, active and conscious fighters in the cause of the Party and vehicles of its policy among the masses.
This new situation makes it necessary to amend the conditions of admission to the Party laid down in the Rules of the C.P.S.U.(B.). The existing system, as prescribed in the Party Rules, of admitting new members into the Party in accordance with four different categories, depending upon the social status of the applicant, is obviously incompatible with the changes in the class structure of Soviet society resulting from the victory of socialism in the U.S.S.R. The need for different categories of admission of new members and of varying probationary periods has disappeared. Accordingly, uniform conditions of admission and a uniform period of probation should be established for all new members, irrespective of whether they belong to the working class, the peasantry or the intelligentsia.
2. It is necessary to add to the section on Party members and their duties a clause on the rights of Party members, rights which are taken for granted but are not specified in the Rules. Such an addition to the Rules would fully accord with the growing activity of Party members and would have exceptional effect in heightening their responsibility for the cause of the Party and in protecting Party members from bureaucracy. Paragraph 57 of the Party Rules states: "The free and business-like discussion of questions of Party policy in the various organizations or in the Party as a whole is the inalienable right of every Party member, derived from inner-party democracy.''
Furthermore, the Rules should specify the following rights of Party members:
a) The right of Party members to criticize any Party worker at Party meetings;
b) The right of Party members to elect and be elected to Party organs;
c) The right of Party members to demand to be present on all 448 occasions when decisions are adopted regarding their activities or conduct;
d) The right of Party members to address any question or statement to any Party body up to and including the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
3. The Rules of the C.P.S.U.(B.) provide for mass purges of the Party by periodical decision of the Central Committee. Experience has shown that they should be dispensed with in the future, for the following reasons:
a) The method of the mass purge, which was introduced at the beginning of the New Economic Policy, when capitalist elements had received a new spurt of life, in order to guard the ranks of the Party from people who had been demoralized owing to the New Economic Policy, has lost its purpose under present conditions when capitalist elements have been eliminated. Moreover, as experience has shown, in practice the method of the mass purge precludes the possibility of an individual approach to Party members, which is the only right one, substituting for it a standard approach to all Party members "by one yardstick." The result of this was that during mass purges there were numerous cases of unwarranted expulsion from the Party, and of hostile elements who had wormed their way into the Party taking advantage of the purges to persecute and ruin honest people.
b) The method of the mass purge does not permit the full observance of the Party principle that Party members, people, must be treated with careful consideration, and in practice it often leads to the infringement of the rights of Party members.
c) The method of the mass purge was of very little effect and did not achieve its purpose with regard to hostile elements who had wormed their way into the Party and who masked their true character by double-dealing and deceiving the Party.
d) It was found that the method of the mass purge was chiefly turned against the so-called passive Party members and led to the expulsion of honest and conscientious members on the alleged grounds of passivity.
For this reason the periodical mass purges of the Party should be abolished, it being laid down that the Party can rid its ranks of people who violate its program and rules by the ordinary procedure.
4. At the Plenum of the Central Committee in February-March 1937 and the Plenum of the Central Committee in January 1938, the Party condemned the formal and heartlessly bureaucratic attitude to the fate of Party members, to the question of expulsion from the __PRINTERS_P_449_COMMENT__ 29---263 449 Party and reinstatement in the Party. As we know this practice was made wide use of by careerist elements who had made their way into the Party and who tried to distinguish and advance themselves by expelling people from its ranks, as well as by masked enemies within the Party who endeavoured by the wholesale infliction of penalties to ruin honest Party members and to sow unnecessary suspicion in the Party ranks.
The Plenum of the Central Committee held in January 1938 adopted a number of measures to put a stop to the practice of wholesale expulsions from the Party and to really ensure a differentiated approach in deciding whether members should be expelled or expelled members reinstated.
Accordingly, the Rules should be supplemented by a number of clauses to ~
a) ensure an attentive approach and careful investigation of accusations brought against Party members;
b) to protect the rights of Party members from all arbitrary procedure;
c) to abolish the resort to expulsion from the Party---which is the supreme Party penalty---for-trifling misdemeanours.
5. It is necessary to abolish the demand contained in the Rules that new members, on joining the Party, in addition to accepting the program and rules of the Party and going through a specified probationary period as candidate members, must also have mastered the program.
In his report at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.iS.U.(B.) in February-March 1937, Comrade Stalin said:
``In order to master the Party program one must be a real Marxist, a tried and theoretically trained Marxist. I do not know whether we have many members of the Party who have mastered our program, who have become real Marxists, theoretically trained and tried. If we continued further along this path we would have to leave only intellectuals and learned people generally in our Party. Who wants such a Party? We have Lenin's thoroughly tried and tested formula defining a member of the Party. According to this formula a member of the Party is one who accepts the program of the Party, pays membership dues and works in one of its organizations. Please note:-Lenin's formula does not speak about mastering the program, but about accepting the program. These are two very different things. It is not necessary to prove 450 that Lenin is right here and not our Party comrades who chatter idly about mastering the program. That should be clear. If the Party had proceeded from the assumption that only those comrades who have mastered the program and have become theoretically trained Marxists could be members of the Party it would not have created thousands ,of Party circles, hundreds of Party schools where the members of the Party are taught Marxism, and where they are assisted to master our program. It is quite clear that if our Party organizes such schools and circles for members of the Party it is because it knows that the members of the Party have not yet mastered the Party program, have not yet become theoretically trained Marxists.''
For these reasons the above-mentioned demand in the Rules should be abolished.
6. The new tasks of the Party arising in connection with the turn in the political life of the country, the adoption of the new Constitution of the U.S.S.R., demanded a corresponding reconstruction of the practical work of the Party on the basis of the absolute and complete application of the principles of inner-party democracy prescribed by the Party Rules. With this object the Party put an end to the violations of the principles of democratic centralism in the Party, and restored the system of election of the leading bodies of Party organizations as the Party Rules provide.
The Party adopted a number of additional measures to ensure the observance of consistent democracy: it abolished the practice of cooption; it forbade voting by lists in elections of Party bodies and introduced voting for individual candidates; it ensured for all Party members the unlimited right to challenge candidates and criticize them; it introduced the secret ballot in the election of Party bodies; and it made the periodical summoning of city meetings of the Party active, and, in large cities, of district meetings of the Party active, a compulsory rule.
The Rules should reflect these new measures of the Party, for they have been tested in practice and ensure the further development of criticism and self-criticism, increased responsibility of Party bodies to the Party membership, and greater activity of the Party membership, and have thus helped to arm the Party for the successful performance of the new tasks of political leadership.
7. In accordance with the Party Rules, there should be integral industrial-branch departments in the regional committees, territorial __PRINTERS_P_451_COMMENT__ 29* 451 committees, Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics, and the Central Committee of the C.R.S.U. (B.) to perform the practical work involved in carrying out Party resolutions and decisions (and to keep a check on the way they are fulfilled by Soviet bodies, business organizations and the lower Party organizations) . The idea was "to concentrate in each industrial-branch department all the work relating to the given branch, namely, Party organizational work, training and allocation of cadres, mass educational work, industrial propaganda, and supervision of the way Party decisions are fulfilled by the appropriate Soviet and business organs and Party organizations.''
Practice has however shown that such an organization of the Party apparatus is inadequate.
The central task of the Party with regard to organization has latterly been and still is the proper selection of people and the keeping of a check on the fulfilment of decisions. Exclusive importance was attached to this question by Lenin, who, at the Eleventh Party Congress, said:
``We have arrived at the position when the whole crux of the matter lies in people, in the selection of people. ... Select the proper people and keep a check on practical fulfilment---and the masses will apreciate it.''
In his report to the Seventeenth Party Congress, Comrade Stalin emphatically stressed the importance of the proper selection of people and of keeping a check on the fulfilment of decisions. He said:
452``Victory never comes by itself---it usually has to be dragged along. Good resolutions, and declarations in favour of the general line of the Party, are nothing but a beginning; for they are only indicative of a desire for victory, not of victory itself. After a correct line has been laid down, after a correct decision has been taken, success will depend on organizational work, on the way the struggle is organized to carry out the line of the Party, on the proper selection of people, on the keeping of a check on the way the decisions of the directing organs are being fulfilled. Failing this, there is a risk that serious injury will be done to the correct Party line and to correct decisions. What is more, once a correct political line has been laid down, organization will decide everything, even the fate of the political line---whether it is carried out or fails.''
Experience has shown that the weaknesses in our organizational work with regard to the selection of people and keeping a check on the fulfilment of decisions have not yet been overcome. The division of the work of selecting cadres among the industrial-branch departments has tended to reduce the scope of organizational work, has hampered necessary transfers of people from one branch to another, their promotion, and their efficient utilization in those sectors which at the given moment are most important to the Party. The division of the work of selecting cadres among the various industrial-branch departments of the Party apparatus has become a real hindrance to the proper performance of the task of selecting and allocating cadres. This task demands that the whole work connected with cadres should be directed from a single centre by centralizing it in one apparatus, where the experience in selecting cadres, studying them and allocating them should be concentrated.
In view of this state of affairs, the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) has adopted a number of measures and has centralized the work of selecting cadres in the Leading Party Organs Department, of the Central Committee. However, bearing in mind the prime importance of the training and selection of cadres and the large amount of work involved, the Leading Party Organs Department should be reorganized, cadre work in all branches being assigned to an independent Cadres Administration, and questions of Party organizational leadership to a special Organization and Instruction Department.
8. The practice of dividing the function of keeping a check on the fulfilment of Party instructions among various industrial-branch departments has also proved unsatisfactory. This work too should be centralized and the functions of the Party Control Commission altered accordingly. It should be the chief task of the Party Control Commission to keep a closer check on the way the decisions of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) are being carried out and to organize systematic verification of the work of the Ibcal organizations. It must be laid down that the Party Control Commission shall work under the auspices of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.). Accordingly, it will be unnecessary for the Party Control Commission to be elected directly at Party congresses. The Party Control Commission should be elected at the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and function under the guidance and direction of the Central Committee.
9. The task of remedying the theoretical and political deficiencies of our Party cadres, of arming our Party members with the theory 453 of Marxism-Leninism and helping them to master Bolshevism demands that the work of Party propaganda and education should be raised to a proper level, in accordance with the decision of the Central Committee "On the Organization of Party Propaganda in Connection with the Publication of the History of the C.P.S.U.(B.)---Short Course."
The Central Committee needs a powerful apparatus of propaganda and agitation in the shape of a Propaganda and Agitation Administration, in which all the work of printed and oral propaganda and agitation would be centralized.
10. The industrial-branch departments of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) should be abolished. An exception should be made in the case of the Agricultural Department, in view of the particular importance of controlling and supervising the activities of the Soviet and Party organizations in the sphere of agriculture, and the School Department, which should exercise control over the state of public education in all the republics.
In the regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics the following departments should be formed: cadres, propaganda and agitation, organization and instruction, and agricultural, all the other industrial-branch departments being abolished.
The district committees and city committees should have the following departments: cadres, propaganda and agitation, and organization and instruction.
The direction of the propaganda and agitation departments and the cadres departments in the regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics should be entrusted to special secretaries.
11. With the rapid progress of the socialist economic system and the rapid political and cultural development of the workers, peasants and intellectuals, the pace of Party and state life has markedly increased. In order to be able to guide state and Party affairs, to react rapidly to new demands as they arise, and to provide timely solutions for new problems, the scheme of existing central organizations of the Party---the Party Congress and the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.)---should be supplemented by a new body, namely, the All-Union Party Conference. This is rendered all the more necessary by the fact that the long interval between Party congresses limits the possibility of advancing to leading posts, and especially to the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), people who have developed 454 in Party work, whereas a conference would give the Party this opportunity. The time is therefore ripe to supplement the scheme of central Party organizations---Party Congress and Central Committee--- by an AllVUnion Party Conference, to be summoned not less than once a year and to consist of representatives of the local organizations, the chief purpose of the Ail-Union Conference being to discuss urgent problems of Party policy.
The All-Union Party Conference should be invested with the right to replace part of the membership of the Central Committee, that is, to remove such members of the Central Committee as are unable to cope with their duties as members of that body, and to replace them by others, in the number, however, of not more than one-fifth of the membership of the Central Committee elected by the Party Congress. The Conference shall replenish the membership of,*'the Central' Committee from among the alternate members of that body elected by the Party Congress, and elect in their place a corresponding number of new alternate members.
The decisions of the Conference shall be subject to endorsement by the Central Committee, with the exception of decisions to replace members of the Central Committee and to elect new alternate members of the Central Committee. Decisions of Conferences endorsed by the Central Committee shall be binding on all Party organizations. The delegates to the Conference shall be elected at plenary meetings of the regional committees, territorial committees and the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics. Members of the Central Committee who have not been elected as delegates from local organizations shall have a voice at the Conference, but no vote.
12. With the progress in Party political work and Party organizational work during this period, the primary organizations have grown, stronger, their contacts with the masses have improved, the vanguard role of the Communists has been enhanced, and Party life has risen to a higher plane. The Party organizations are taking a closer interest in the practical problems of economic and cultural development.
Experience has shown that the Party organizations have worked well wherever they have been able to combine Party political work with the fight for the fulfilment of production plans, for the improvement of the work of the state apparatus, for the mastery of new technique, for strict labour discipline, for the development of the Stakhanov movement, and for the promotion of new cadres to Party and business posts. And, vice versa, wherever the Party organizations 455 have held aloof from production, confining their duties to agitation, or Wherever the Party organizations have taken upon themselves the unwarranted function of directing business affairs, assuming the duties of the business bodies and detracting from their responsibility, there the work has inevitably found itself in difficulties.
The time is now ripe for a more precise definition of the duties of the various types of primary Party organizations, and, in particular, of such differing types as those in production units (factories, mills, state farms, collective farms) and those in People's Commissariats. Party organizations of the production type (factory, mill, state farm, collective farm) should be given the right to exercise control over the state of affairs in factories, state farms or collective farms. This should result in enhancing the role and sense of responsibility of primary Party organizations in production units. As to the Party organizations in the People's Commissariats, inasmuch as they cannot exercise functions of control, owing to the specific conditions of their work, they should play a greater part in improving the work of the state apparatus. It is their duty to draw attention to defects in their particular People's Commissariat, to note shortcomings in the work of any of the personnel, and to inform the Central Committee and the heads of the People's Commissariat of them.
All Party members working in a given People's Commissariat should be united in one general Party organization of that People's Commissariat. The secretary of the Party organization of a People's Commissariat should be endorsed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
13. In, view of the fact that the sympathizers' groups were instituted at a time when the admission of new members into the Party was suspended, and bearing in mind that the Party is able to reinforce its ranks from among the foremost members of the non-Party active in the Soviets, trade unions, Young Communist League, cooperative societies, the Air and Chemical Defence Society and other social organizations of the working people, the sympathizers' groups should be abolished.
__*_*_*__The Eighteenth Party Congress of the C.P.S.U.fB.) resolves to make the following amendments and additions to the Rules of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
456 __NUMERIC_LVL3__ I __ALPHA_LVL3__ Party Members and Their Rights and Duties1. The existing categories of transfer of candidate members to full membership shall be abolished and a single system of transfer of candidate members to full membership established for workers, peasants and intellectuals. Persons may be accepted into the Party on reaching the age of eighteen. All persons applying to join the Party shall submit recommendations from thre.e Party members who have been members of the Party for at least three years and who know the applicant from having worked with him for not less than one year. In the case of former members of other parties the present provisions of the Rules shall be preserved. The provision of the Rules demanding that applicants for admission to the Party must submit the opinion of the social organization where they work, or have worked, shall be abolished. The decision of a primary Party organization to accept a new member into the Party shall come into force when endorsed by the district committee or the city committee. The presence of the recommenders is not required when an application for admission to the Party is discussed.
2. The section on Party members and their duties shall be supplemented by a clause specifying the rights of Party members, which shall include:
, a) The right of Party members to criticize any Party worker at Party meetings;
b) The right of Party members to elect and be elected to Party organs;
c) The right of Party members to demand to be present on all occasions when decisions are adopted regarding their activities or conduct;
d) The right of Party members to address any question or statement to any Party body, up to and including the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
3. Periodical mass purges of the Party shall be abolished; the Party may rid its ranks of persons who have violated the program, rules and discipline of the Party by the ordinary procedure.
4. When discussing the expulsion of a member from the Party or the reinstatement of a member into the Party the maximum caution shall be exercised, the maximum comradely consideration shown, 457 and a thorough investigation made to ascertain whether the grounds for the accusations brought against the Party member are justified. In the case of minor offenses (non-attendance at meetings, uripunctual payment of membership dues, etc.) the measures of Party education and influence specified in the Rules should be applied and not expulsion from the Party, which is the supreme Party penalty.
5. The decision of a primary Party organization to expel a member from the Party or to reinstate an expelled member shall come into force only if endorsed by the regional committee, the territorial committee, or the Central Committee of the Communist Party of aa national republic.
Pending the endorsement of a decision of expulsion by the regional committee, the territorial committee, or the Central Committee of the Communist Party of a national republic, the Party member shall retain his Party card and shall be entitled to attend Party meetings. Regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of Communist Parties of national republics shall announce all expulsions of members in the local Party press and indicate the reasons for the expulsion, and shall likewise announce the reinstatement of persons wrongfully expelled.
6. Appeals against expulsion from the Party shall be examined by the competent Party bodies within a period not exceeding one fortnight.
7. The demand contained in the Rules that comrades who have passed through their probationary period as candidate members, who accept the program of the Party and submit to its rules and discipline cannot, nevertheless, be regarded as Party members until they have mastered the Party program, that is, until they have become educated Marxists, shall be abolished.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ II __ALPHA_LVL3__ Candidate Members8. The section on candidate members of the Party shall be made to conform with the section on Party members (abolition of the categories of admission).
9. A uniform period of candidate membership, viz., one year, shall be established for workers, peasants and intellectuals.
10. The existing provisions of the Rules shall be retained in the case of former members of other parties.
458 __NUMERIC_LVL3__ III __ALPHA_LVL3__ Organizational Structure of the Party11. The following provisions, arising from the aim of practising consistant democracy in the Party and thoroughly observing the principles of democratic centralism, shall be inserted in the Rules:
a) Voting by lists in the elections of Party bodies shall be forbidden. Voting shall be by individual candidates, every Party member being ensured the unlimited right to challenge the candidates nominated and to criticize them;
b) Party bodies shall be elected by secret ballot.
12. In view of the/exceptional political importance of the Party active in the life of the Party, the Rules shall be supplemented by the following clause on the subject of actives ,of city organizations:
It is considered essential that in all republican, territorial and regional centres without exception, as well as in all industrial centres of any size, meetings of the actives of the city Party organizations shall be convened for the discussion of the more important decisions of the Party and the Government; that the meetings of the actives shall be summoned not for parade and the formal and ceremonial approval of the decisions, but for their genuine discussion; and that in large centres, meetings of district Party actives should be summoned in addition to meetings of the city actives.
13. The industrial-branch departments of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) shall be abolished, with the exception of the Agricultural Department and the School Department.
The Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) shall have the following administrations and departments:
a) Cadres Administration;
b) Propaganda and Agitation Administration;
c) Instruction and Organization Department;
d) Agricultural Department;
e) School Department.
Regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics shall have the following departments:
a) Cadres Department;
b) Propaganda and Agitation Department;
c) Organization and Instruction Department;
d) Agricultural Department.
459City committees and district committees shall have the following departments:
a) Cadres Department;
b) Propaganda and Agitation Department;
c) Organization and Instruction Department.
Each district committee, city committee, area committee, regional committee, territorial committee and Central Committee of the Communist Parties of the national republics shall have a Military Department, whose function it shall be to assist the military authorities in registering persons liable to military service, in calling up recruits, in mobilization in the event of war, in the organization of air defence, etc.
14. In amendment of the existing procedure as laid down in the Rules, the Party Control Commission shall be elected by the Plenum of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and shall function under the guidance of the Central Committee.
The Party Control Commission shall:
a) Keep a check on the fulfilment of the directions of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) by Soviet organs, business organs and Party organizations;
b) Exercise supervision over the activities of the local Party organizations ;
c) Call to account persons guilty of violating the Program and Rules of the C.P.S.U. (B.) or Party discipline.
15. The direction of the propaganda and agitation departments and the cadres departments of regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics shall be entrusted to special secretaries.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ IV __ALPHA_LVL3__ Central Institutions of the Party16. The following provisions for an Ail-Union Party Conference shall be added-to the Rules:
a) All-Union Conferences shall consist of representatives from the local organizations and shall be summoned for the discussion of urgent problems of Party policy;
b) Ail-Union Conferences shall be summoned not less than once a year;
c) The delegates to the All-Union Conference shall be elected at plenary meetings of regional committees, territorial committees and 460 the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics;
d) The procedure for the election of delegates to the All-Union Conference and the basis of representation shall be determined by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.);
e) The All-Union Party Conference shall have the right to replace part of the membership of the Central Committee, that is, to remove such members of the Central Committee as are unable to cope with their duties as members of that body, and to replace them by others, in a number, however, not exceeding one-fifth of the membership of the Central Committee elected by the Party Congress. The All-Union Conference shall replenish the membership of the Central Committee from among the alternate members of that body elected by the Party Congress, and elect in their place a corresponding number of new alternate members;
f) The decisions of the All-Union Conference shall be subject to endorsement by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), with the exception of decisions to replace members of the Central Committee and to elect new alternate members of the Central Committee. Decisions of the All-Union Conference endorsed by the Central Committee shall be binding on all Party organizations;
g) Members of the Central Committee who have not been elected as delegates from local organizations shall have a voice, at the AllUnion Conference, but no vote.
17. The existing procedure laid down in the Rules whereby the Soviet Control Commission is nominated by the Party Congress shall be amended so that henceforth the appointment of the Soviet Control Commission shall lie within the competence of the organs of Soviet government.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ V __ALPHA_LVL3__ Length of Party Membership Required of Secretaries of18. With the object of creating the necessary conditions for the advancement of new cadres of Party workers to leading Party posts, and in amendment of the existing clauses of the Rules, the length of Party membership required in the case of secretaries of regional 461 committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the national republics shall be not less than five years instead of twelve years, in the case of secretaries of city committees not less than three years instead of ten years, in the case of secretaries of district committees not less than three years instead of seven years, and in the case of secretaries of primary Party organizations and shop Party organizations not less than one year instead of not less than three years in the case of the former, and not less than two years in the case of the latter.
Chiefs of the political administrations of military areas, fleets and armies must have a membership standing of five years instead of ten, and chiefs of political departments of divisions and brigades three years instead of six.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ VI __ALPHA_LVL3__ Territorial, Regional, and Republican Party19. Regional committees,, territorial committees and the Central Committee^)of the Communist Parties of'the national republics shall have four or five secretaries, including a first secretary, a second secretary, a cadres secretary and a propaganda secretary.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ VII __ALPHA_LVL3__ Area Party Organizations20. Area Party organizations shall have constitutional rights, the Rules of the C.P.S.U.(B.) being supplemented by the necessary clauses.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ VIII __ALPHA_LVL3__ City and District (Rural and Urban) Party21. Plenary meetings of city and district committees shall be convened not less than once in .six weeks.
462 __NUMERIC_LVL3__ IX __ALPHA_LVL3__ Party Organizations in the Red Army and Navy22. In view of the formation of the People's Commissariat of the Navy, the provisions of the rules relating to Party organizations in the Red Army shall be extended to Party organizations in the Navy, the Political Administration of the Navy functioning as the Naval Department of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ X __ALPHA_LVL3__ Primary Party Organizations23. In order to enhance the role of the primary Party organizations in productive enterprises, including state farms, collective farms and machine and tractor stations, and their responsibility for the state af the work in the enterprises, these organizations shall be granted the right of control over the work of the management of the enterprises.
It is the duty of Party organizations in People's Commissariats, which, owing to the specific conditions of their work, cannot exercise functions of control, to draw attention to defects in the work of their institution, to note shortcomings in the work of the People's Commissariat and of^^1^^ any of its personnel and to communicate their information and opinions to the Central Committee, of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and to the heads of the People's Commissariat.
Secretaries^ of Party organizations in People's Commissariats shall be endorsed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.)
All Communists working in the central apparatus of a People's Commissariat shall belong to one general Party organization of that People's Commissariat.
24. In amendment of the existing rule, the elected organs of primary Party organizations shall not be called committees, but bureaus (the bureau of such-and-such a Party organization).
25. Bureaus of primary Party organizations shall be formed in organizations with not less than fifteen members.
26. With the object of rapidly training and educating Party members in collective leadership, a shop Party organization with not less than fifteen and not more than one hundred members shall have the right to elect a bureau of the shop Party organization consisting of three to five persons; a shop organization with over one hundred members may elect a bureau of five to seven persons.
27. Primary Party organizations with less than one hundred 463 Communists may form Party groups in the various brigades, sections of the enterprise,, etc.
28. In large factories and institutions where there are over five hundred Party members and candidate members, factory committees may be formed---the sanction of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) being required in every case---the shop Party organizations in such factories and institutions being granted the rights of primary Party organizations.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ XI __ALPHA_LVL3__ The Party and the Young Communist League29. The Rules of the C.P.S.U.(B.) shall be supplemented by the following provisions relating to the Party and the Young Communist League:
a) The Y.C.L. shall conduct all its activities under the direct guidance of the C.P.S.U.(B.). The Central Committee of the Y.C.L., as its leading body, shall be directly subordinated to the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.). The activities of the local organizations of the Y.C.L. shall be directed and controlled by the appropriate republican, territorial, regional, city and district organizations of the Party.
b) Members of the Y.C.L. shall retire from that body when they become members or candidate members of the Party, provided they do not fill leading posts in the Y.C.L. organizations.
c) The Y.C.L. is the active assistant of the Party in all state and economic affairs. The Y.C.L. organizations must be in effect active vehicles of the Party's directions in all spheres of socialist construction, and where there are no primary Party organizations, shall bear entire responsibility for the carrying out of these directions.
d) Y.C.L. organizations shall enjoy wide initiative in discussing and submitting to the appropriate organizations all questions designed to remove defects in the work of their factory, collective farm, state farm or institution and to help them to improve their work by means of the organization of socialist emulation and shock work, mass campaigns, etc.
__ALPHA_LVL3__ Special DecisionPersons accepted as candidate members of the Party before the Eighteenth Congress shall undergo the term of probation laid down for all candidate members, namely, one year.
March 20, 1939
464 __ALPHA_LVL2__ RULES OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF THEThe Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks), as a Section of the Communist International, is the organized vanguard of the .'working class of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the highest form of its class organization. In its activities the Party is guided by the theory of Marxism-Leninism.
The Party exercises the leadership of the working class, the peasantry, the intelligentsia, of the entire Soviet people, in the struggle for the consolidation of the dictatorship of the working class, for the consolidation and development of the socialist system, for the victory of communism.
The Party is the guiding nucleus of all organizations of the work. ing people, both public and state, and ensures the successful construction of the communist society.
The Party is a united militant organization bound together by a conscious discipline which is equally binding on all its members. The Party is strong because of its solidarity, unity of will and unity of action, which are incompatible with any deviation from its program and rules, with any violation of Party discipline, with factional groupings, or with double-dealing. The Party purges its ranks of persons who violate its program, rules or discipline.
The Party demands from its members active and self-sacrificing work in carrying out its program and rules, in fulfilling all decisions of the Party and its bodies, and in ensuring the unity of its ranks and the consolidation of fraternal international relations among the __PRINTERS_P_465_COMMENT__ 30---263 465 working people of the nationalities of the U.S.S.R. as well as with the proletarians of all countries of the world.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ IParty Members, Their Duties and Rights
1. A Party member is one who accepts the program of the Party, works in one of its organizations, submits to its decisions and pays membership dues.
2. It is the duty of a Party member:
a) To work untiringly to improve his political knowledge and to master the principles of Marxism-Leninism;
b) Strictly to observe Party discipline, to take an active part in the political life of the Party and the country, and to carry into practise the policy of the Party and the decisions of its bodies;
c) To set an example in the observance of labour and state discipline, to master the technique of his work and constantly to
.improve his industrial or business qualifications;
d) Constantly to strengthen the ties with the masses, promptly to respond to the needs and demands of the working people, and to explain to the masses the policy and decisions of the Party.
3. A Party member has the right:
, a) To take part in the free and business-like. discussion at Party meetings or in the Party press of practical questions of Party policy;
b) To criticize any Party worker at Party meetings;
c) To elect and be elected to Party organs;
d) To demand to be present in person whenever decisions are taken regarding his activities or conduct;
e) To address any question or statement to any Party body, up to and including the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
4. Members are admitted to the Party only individually. New members are admitted from among the candidate members who have been through the specified probationary period. Membership of the Party is open to conscientious and active workers, peasants and intellectuals who are devoted to the cause of communism.
Persons may join the Party on attaining the age of eighteen. The procedure of admission of candidate members to full Party membership is as follows:
466a) Applicants for Party membership must submit recommendations from three Party members who have a Party standing iof not less than three years and who know the applicants from haying worked with them for not less than one year.
Note 1. In the case of members of the Young Communist League applying for membership of the Party, the recommendation of a district committee of the Y.C.L. is equivalent to the recommendation of one Party member.
Note 2. Members and alternate members of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) shall refrain from giving recommendations.
b) Applications for Party membership are discussed and decided at the general meeting of a primary Party organization, whose decision takes effect after endorsement by the district Party committee, or by the city Party committee in cities with no district 'divisions.
The presence of the recommenders at the discus'sion of applications for Party [membership is not essential.
c) Persons up to the age of twenty may join the Party only through the Young Communist League.
d) Former members of other parties are admitted to the C.P.S.U. (B.) in exceptional cases and require the recommendation of five Party members: three of ten years' Party standing and two of pre-- revolutionary Party standing. They may be admitted only through a primary Party organization, and the endorsement of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) is essential.
5. Persons recommending applicants for admission to the Party are responsible for their bona fides.
6. The Party standing of a candidate member admitted to full membership dates from the day of the decision of the general meeting of the primary Party organization to adopt him as full member.
7. A member of one Party organization who removes to the locality of another Party organization shall be entered on the membership rolls of the latter.
Note. The transfer of Party members from one organization to another is effected in accordance with regulations laid down by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
8. A Party member or candidate member who fails to pay membership dues for three months in succession without sufficient reason is regarded as having dropped out of the Party; a decision to this __PRINTERS_P_467_COMMENT__ 30* 467 effect is taken by the primary Party organization and is subject to endorsement by the Party district committee or city committee.
9. The question of the expulsion of any member from the Party is decided by the general meeting of the primary Party organization to which he belongs and must be endorsed by the Party district or city committee. The decision of a district or city committee to expel a member takes effect only when endorsed by the regional committee, territorial committee, or Central Committee of the Communist Party of a Union Republic.
10. Until such time as his expulsion is endorsed by the regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of a Communist Party of a Union Republic, the Party member retains his membership card and is entitled to attend closed Party meetings.
Regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of Communist Parties of Union Republics shall announce in the local (Party press the expulsion of Party members and indicate the reasons for expulsion, and shall likewise announce the reinstatement of persons wrongfully expelled from the Party.
11. When the question of the expulsion of a Party member or the reinstatement of an expelled member is discussed, the maximum caution and comradely consideration must be exercised, and the grounds for the accusations brought against the Party member thoroughly investigated.
In the case of minor offenses (failure to attend meetinigs, unpunctual payment of membership dues, etc.) the measures of Party education and influence specified in the Rules should be applied, and not expulsion from the Party, which is the supreme Party penalty.
12. Appeals against expulsion from the Party must be examined by the Party bodies to which they are addressed within not more than two weeks from the date of receipt.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ II __ALPHA_LVL3__ Candidate Members13. All persons desirous of joining the Party must pass through a probationary period as candidate members, the object of which is to give them an opportunity to familiarize themselves with the program, rules and tactics of the Party and to enable the Party organizations to test the personal qualities of the candidates.
14. The procedure of admission of candidate members (individual 468 admission, submission of recommendations and their verification, decision of the primary organization as to admission and the endorsement of the decision) is identical with the procedure of admission of Party members.
15. The period of probationary membership is fixed at one year.
16. Candidate members attend the meetings of the organization to which they are attached, and have a voice but no vote.
17. Candidate members pay the usual membership dues to the local (Party committee. .
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ III __ALPHA_LVL3__ Organizational Structure of the Party. Inner-Party18. The guiding principle of the organizational structure of the Party is democratic centralism, which signifies:
a) The election of all leading Party bodies, from the highest to the lowest;
b) Periodical reports of the Party bodies to their Party organizations;
c) Strict Party discipline and .subordination of the minority to the majority;
d) The absolutely binding character of the decisions of higher bodies upon lower bodies.
19. The Party is built on the territorial-industrial principle: a Party organization serving a given area is regarded as higher than any Party organization serving (part of that area; and a Party organization serving a whole branch of work is regarded as higher than any Party organization serving part of that branch of work.
20. All Party organizations are autonomous in the decision of local questions, provided that their decisions ido not conflict with the decisions of the Party.
21. The highest governing body in each Party organization is the general membership meeting (in the case of primary organizations), 'conference (e.g., in the case of district or regional organizations), or congress (in the case of.Communist Parties of Union Republics and in the case of the C.P.S.U.[B.]).
22. The general meeting, conference or congress elects a bureau 469 or committee which acts as its executive body and directs all the current work of the particular organization.
23. Voting by lists of candidates in the election of Party bodies is forbidden. Voting shall be by individual candidates, every Party member being ensured the unlimited right to challenge the candidates nominated and to criticize them. Voting of candidates shall be by secret ballot.
24. In all republican, territorial and regional centres, as well as in the larger industrial centres, meetings of the active members [ actives] of the city Party organizations shall be convened for the discussion of the more important decisions of the Party and the Government. Actives shall be convened not for parade and the formal and ceremonial approval of decisions, but for their genuine discussion.
In large centres, meetings of district as well as city Party actives shall be convened.
25. The free and business-like discussion of questions of Party policy in individual organizations or in the Party as a whole is the inalienable right of every Party member and logically follows from inner-party democracy. -Only on the basis of inner-party democracy iis it possible to> develop .Bolshevik self-criticism and to strengthen Party discipline, which must be conscious -and not mechanical. But wide discussion, especially discussion on an Ail-Union scale, of questions of Party policy must be so organized as to prevent it leading to attempts by an insignificant minority to impose their will upon the vast miajority of the Party, or to attempts to form factional groupings which break the unity of the Party, attempts at splits which may shake the strength and firmness of the dictatorship of the working class. Therefore, a wide discussion on an All-Union scale can be regarded as necessary only if: a) this necessity is recognized by at least several local Party organizations of the scale of a region or republic ; b) if there is not a sufficiently solid majority, on the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) on important questions of Party policy; c) if in spite of the existence of a solid majority on the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) advocating a definite standpoint, the Central Committee still deems it necessary to test the correctness of its policy by means of a discussion in the Party. Only compliance with these conditions can safeguard the Party against abuse of innerParty democracy by anti-Party elements, only under these conditions is it possible to count on inner-Party democracy benefiting the cause and on it not being used to the detriment of the Party and the working class.
47026. The scheme of Party organization is as follows:
a) Party as a whole---AH-Union Congress, Central Committee of the C.P,S.U.(B.), All-Union Conference;
b) Regions, territories, Union Republics---regional or territorial conferences, congresses of the Communist Parties of Union Republics, regional committees, territorial committees, Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union Republics;
c) Areas---area conferences, area committees;
d) Cities, districts---city and district conferences, city and district committees;
e) Factories, villages, collective farms, machine and tractor stations, units of the Red Army and Navy, offices---general meetings, conferences of primary Party organizations, bureaus of primary Party organizations.
27. The Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) has the following administrations and departments for the performance of the practical work involved in the carrying out of Party decisions: a) Cadres Administration, b) Propaganda and Agitation Administration, c) Organization and Instruction Department, d) Agricultural Department, e) School Department; in the area committees, regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of Union Republics: a) Cadres Department, b) Propaganda and Agitation Department, c) Organization and Instruction Department, d) Agricultural Department, e) Military Department; in the city committees and district committees: a) Cadres Department, b) Propaganda and Agitation Department, c) Organization and Instruction Department, d) Military Department.
It is the function of the Military Departments to assist the military authorities in organizing the registration of persons liable to military service, in the calling up of recruits, in mobilization in the event of war, in the organization of air defence, etc.
The direction of the Propaganda and Agitation Departments and the Cadres Departments of regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union Republics shall be entrusted to special secretaries.
28. Every Party organization, once it is finally confirmed, has the right to have its own seal, but only with the sanction of the competent higher Party organization.
471 __NUMERIC_LVL3__ IV __ALPHA_LVL3__ Higher Party Organs29. The supreme organ of the C.P.S.U. (B.) is the Party Congress. Ordinary congresses are convened not less than once in three years. Extraordinary congresses are convened by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) on its own initiative or at the demand of not less than one-third of the total membership represented at the preceding Party congress. The convocation of a Party Congress and its agenda shall be announced not later than six weeks before the Congress. Extraordinary congresses shall be convened within two months.
The Congress is regarded as iproperly constituted if the delegates represent not less than one-half of the total Party membership represented at the preceding ordinary congress.
The basis of representation at a Party Congress is determined by the Central Committee of the iC.P.S.U. (B.).
30. In the event of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) failing to call an extraordinary congress within the period specified in clause 29, the organizations which demanded it have the right to form an Organization Committee which shall enjoy the powers of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) as regards the convocation of the extraordinary congress.
31. The Congress:
a) Hears and acts on the reports of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.), of the Central Auditing Commission, and of other central organizations;
b) Revises and amends the program and rules of the Party;
c) Determines the tactical line of the Party on major questions of current policy;
d) Elects the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and the Central Auditing Commission.
32. The number of members to be elected to the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and to the Central Auditing Commission is determined by the Congress. In the event of members dropping out of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), their places are filled from among the alternate members elected by the Congress.
33. The Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) holds not less than one plenary meeting every four months. Alternate members of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) attend its plenary meetings with voice but no vote.
47234. The Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) sets up a Political Bureau for political work, an Organization Bureau for the general direction of organizational work, a Secretariat for current work of an organizational or executive nature and a Party Control Commission to keep check on the way decisions of the Party and the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) are fulfilled.
35. The Party Control Commission:
a) Keeps a check on the way the decisions of the Party and of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) are fulfilled by Party organizations and Soviet and economic bodies;
b) Investigates the work of local Party organizations;
c) Takes action against those who have violated the program or rules of the C.P.S.U. (iB.), or Party discipline.
36. The Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) guides the entire work of the Party in the interval between congresses, represents the Party in its relations with other parties, organizations and institutions, sets up various Party institutions and guides their activities, appoints the editorial boards of the central organs under its control and confirms the appointment of the editorial boards of the Party organs of big local organizations, organizes and manages enterprises of a public character, distributes the forces and resources of the Party and manages the central funds.
The Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) directs the work of the central Soviet and public organizations thr6ugh the Party groups within them.
37. In the interval between Party congresses the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) convenes, not less than once a year, an AilUnion Party Conference consisting of the representatives of the local Party organizations for the discussion of urgent problems of Party policy.
The delegates to the All-Union Conference are elected at plenary meetings of regional committees, territorial committees and the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union Republics.
The procedure for the election of delegates to the All-Union Conference and the basis of representation are determined by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.).
Members of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) who have not been elected as delegates from local organizations have a voice at the All-Union Conference, but no vote.
38. The AH-Union Conference has the right to replace part of the 473 membership of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), that is, to remove such members of the Central Coromittee as have failed to cope with their duties as members of that Ibody, and to replace them by others, in a number, however, not exceeding one-fifth of the membership of the Central Committee elected at the Party Congress.
The Ail-Union Conference replenishes the membership of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) from among the alternate members of that body elected by the Party Congress, and elects in their place a corresponding number of new alternate members.
39. The decisions of the All-Union Conference are subject to endorsement by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), with the exception of decisions to replace members of the Central Committee and to elect new members and alternate members to that body.
Decisions of the Ail-Union Conference 'endorsed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) are binding on all Party organizations.
40. In order to strengthen Bolshevik leadership and political work, the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) has the right to create Political .Departments and to assign Party organizers of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) to lagging sectors of socialist construction which have acquired special importance for the national economy and the country in general; and, in the measure that the Political Departments complete their urgent tasks, to convert them into ordinary Party organs on the industrial-territorial principle.
The work of the Political Departments is governed by special instructions endorsed by the Central 'Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.).
41. The Central Committee of the G.P.S.U.(B.) keeps the Party organizations regularly informed of its work.
42. The Central Auditing Commission: a) investigates whether affairs are handled expeditiously and properly by the central organs of the Party and whether the apparatus of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) is working smoothly, and b) audits the accounts of the treasury and the enterprises of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ V __ALPHA_LVL3__ The Regional, Territorial and Republican Party43. The highest organ of a regional, territorial or republican Party organization is the regional or territorial Party conference or the Congress of the Communist Party of the Union Republic, and, in the 474 interval between them, the regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic. They guide themselves in their activities by the decisions of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks) and its leading bodies.
44. Ordinary regional or territorial conferences or congresses of the Communist Parties of Union Republics are convened once every eighteen months by the particular regional or territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic. Extraordinary conferences or congresses are convened by decision of the particular regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic, or at the demand of one-third of the total membership of the organizations belonging to the regional, territorial or republican Party organization.
The basis of representation at regional or territorial conferences or congresses of Communist Parties of Union Republics is determined by the particular regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic.
Regional and territorial conferences and congresses of Communist Parties of Union Republics hear and act on the reports of the regional or territorial committee, or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic, of the Auditing Commission and of the other regional, territorial or republican organizations, discuss questions of Party, Soviet, economic and trade union work in the particular region, territory or republic, and elect a regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic, as the case may be, an Auditing Commission and delegates to the All-Union Congress of the Party.
45. Regional and territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union Republics each appoint an executive body for the performance of current work, consisting of not more than eleven persons and of four or five secretaries, including a first secretary, a second secretary, a cadres secretary and a propaganda secretary, to be confirmed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.). The secretaries must have a Party standing of not less than five ;years.
46. The regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union Republics organize various Party institutions within their particular region, territory or republic, guide their activities, appoint the editorial board of the regional, territorial or republican Party organ which works under their control, direct the Party groups in the non-Party organizations, 475 organize and conduct their own enterprises of general importance to the particular region, territory or republic, distribute within the limits of their organization the forces and resources of the Party, and manage the Party funds of the region, territory or republic.
47. Plenary meetings of regional committees, territorial committees and Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union Republics are convened at least once every three months.
48. Party organizations in autonomous republics and in national and other regions forming part of a territory or Union Republic work under the direction of their particular territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic and guide their internal life by the regulations set forth in Section V of the Party Rules relating to regional, territorial and republican organizations.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ VI __ALPHA_LVL3__ Area Party Organizations49. Area Party organizations are formed in regions, territories and republics which have areas.
The highest organ of an area Party organization is the Area Party Conference which is convened by the area committee at least once in eighteen months; extraordinary conferences are convened by decision of the area committee or at the demand of one-third of the total membership of the organizations belonging to the area organization.
The area conference hears and acts on the reports of the area committee, the auditing commission and the other area Party organizations, elects the area Party committee, the auditing commission and the delegates to the regional or territorial conference, or the congress of the Communist Party of the Union Republic.
50. Each area committee elects a bureau consisting of not more than nine persons and four secretaries---a first secretary, a second secretary, a cadres secretary and a propaganda secretary. The secretaries must have a Party standing of not less than three years. Secretaries of area committees must foe confirmed by the regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic.
51. Area committees organize various Party institutions within the area and direct their activities, appoint the editorial board of the area Party organ which works under their direction and control, direct the Party igroups .in non-Party organizations, organize their own 476 enterprises of importance to their area, distribute within the limits of their area the forces and resources of the Party, and manage the area Party funds.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ VII __ALPHA_LVL3__ City and District (Rural and Urban)52. City and district Party conferences are convened by the city and district committees at least once a year; extraordinary conferences are convened by decision of the city or district committee, or at the demand of one-third of the total membership of the organizations in the city or district.
The city or district conference hears and acts on the reports of the city or district committee, of the auditing commission and other city or district institutions, elects the city or district committee, the auditing commission and the delegates to territorial or regional conference or the congress of the Communist Party of the Union Republic.
53. Each city or district committee elects a bureau consisting of from seven to nine persons and three secretaries. Secretaries of city and district committees must have a Party standing of not less than three years. Secretaries of city and district committees tnust be confirmed by the regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic.
54. The city or district committee organizes and confirms the primary Party organizations in industrial enterprises, state farms, machine and tractor stations, collective farms and offices, keeps a register of Communists, organizes various Party institutions in the city or district and guides their activities, appoints the editorial board of the city or district Party organ which works under its direction and control, directs the Party groups in the non-Party organizations, organizes its own enterprises of general importance for the city or district, distributes the forces and resources of the Party in the city or district, and manages the city or district Party funds. The city or district committee submits to the regional committee, territorial committee or Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic reports on its activities at times and in the form established by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B-).
47755. Plenary meetings of the city or district committee are convened not less than once in six weeks.
56. In big cities, district organizations subordinate to the city committee may be set up with the permission of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ VIII __ALPHA_LVL3__ Primary Party Organizations57. The primary Party organizations are the basis of the Party.
Primary Party organizations are set up in mills, factories, state farms, machine and tractor stations and other economic establishments, in collective farms, units of the Red Army and Navy, in villages, offices, educational establishments, etc., where there are not less than three Party members.
In factories, collective farms, offices, etc., where there are less than three Party members, candidate member or Party and Young Communist League groups are set up headed by a Party organizer appointed by the district committee, city committee or political department.
Primary Party organizations are confirmed by the district or city committees or by the competent political departments.
58. In factories, offices, collective farms, etc., where there are over one hundred Party members and candidate members, shop, sectional, departmental, etc., Party organizations may be formed within the general primary Party organization covering the whole factory, office, etc., subject to the approval in each particular case of the district or city committee or ,of the political department, as the case may be.
Within shop, sectional, etc., organizations, and within primary Party organizations with less than one hundred members and candidate members, Party groups may be formed in the brigades or machine units of the enterprise.
59. In large factories and offices where there are over five hundred Party members and candidate members, factory committees may be formed, the sanction of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) being required in every case; the shop Party organizations in such establishments are granted the rights of primary Party organizations.
60. The primary Party organization connects the mass of the workers, peasants and intellectuals with the leading organs of the Party. Its task is:
478a) To conduct agitational and organizational work among the masses for the carrying out of the Party slogans and decisions, and to ensure effective leadership of the factory press;
b) To recruit new members for the Party and to organize their political education;
c) To assist the district committee, city committee or political department in all its practical work;
d) To mobilize the efforts of the masses in the factories, state farms, collective farms, etc., for the fulfilment of the production plan, for the strengthening of labour discipline and for the development of socialist emulation and shock work;
e) To combat laxity and mismanagement in factories, state farms and collective farms, and to show a daily concern for the improvement of the cultural and living conditions of the workers and collective farmers;
f) To take an active part in the economic and political life of the country.
61. In order to enhance the role of the primary Party organizations in productive establishments, including state farms, collective farms and machine and tractor stations, and their responsibility for the state of the work in the establishments, these organizations have the right of control over the work of the management of their particular establishments.
It is the duty of Party organizations in People's Commissariats, which, owing to the specific conditions of their work, cannot exercise, functions of control, to draw attention to defects in the work of their institution, to note shortcomings in the work of the People's Comissariat and of any of its personnel and to communicate their information and opinions to the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) and to the heads of the People's Commissariat.
Secretaries of primary Party organizations in People's Commissariats are endorsed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.).
All Communists working in the central apparatus of a People's Commissariat belong to one general Party organization of that People's Commissariat.
62. For the performance of current work the primary Party organization elects a bureau consisting of not more than eleven persons for a term of one year.
Bureaus of primary Party organizations are formed in organizations with not less than fifteen members. »
479In Party organizations having less than fifteen members, no bureaus are formed, but a secretary of the primary Party organization is elected.
With the object of rapidly training and educating Party members in collective leadership, a shop Party organization with not less than fifteen and not 'more than one hundred members has the right to elect a bureau of the shop Party organization consisting of f rom three to five persons; a shop organization with over one hundred members may elect a bureau of from five to seven persons.
In primary Party organizations with not more than one hundred Party members, the Party work is conducted as a rule by comrades who are not exempted from their regular jobs.
Primary Party organizations with about one thousand Party members have two to three paid workers, and organizations with about three thousand or more members, four or five full-time workers.
Secretaries of primary and shop Party organizations must have a Party standing of at least one year.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ IX __ALPHA_LVL3__ The Party and the Young Communist League63. The Leninist Young Communist League conducts its activities under the guidance of the C.P.S.U. (B.). The Central Committee of the Y.C.L., as its leading body, is subordinated to the Central Committee of the CJP.S.U.(B.). The activities of the local organizations of the Y.G.L. are directed and controlled by the appropriate republican, territorial, regional, city and district organizations of the Party.
64. Members of the Y.C.L. shall retire from that body from the moment they become members or candidate members of the Party, provided they do not fill leading posts in the Y.C.L. organizations.
65. The Y.C.L. is an active assistant of the Party in all state and economic work. The Y.C.L. organizations must be in effect active vehicles of the Party's directions in all spheres of socialist construction, especially where there are no primary Party organizations.
66. Y.C.L. organizations enjoy wide initiative in discussing and submitting to the appropriate Party organizations all questions designed to remove defects in the work of their factory, collective farm, state farm or office and to help them to improve their work, to organize socialist emulation and shock work, to. conduct mass campaigns, etc.
480 __NUMERIC_LVL3__ X __ALPHA_LVL3__ Party Organizations in the Red Army and Navy and in the67. The guidance of Party work in the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army is exercised by the Political Administration of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army which functions as the Military Department of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.), and in the Workers' and Peasants' Navy and in the transiport system by the Political Administration of the Navy and the Political Administrations of the transport system which function respectively as the Naval Department and the corresponding Transport Department of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.).
The Political Administrations of the Red Army, the Navy, and the transport system perform their work of guidance through Political Departments, (Military Commissars and Party organizers appointed by them, and through Party Commissions elected at army, Navy and railway conferences.
Party organizations in the Red Army, Navy and in the transport system work on the basis of special instructions confirmed by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
68. The chiefs of political departments of military areas, fleets and armies, and the chiefs of the political departments of the railways must be Party members of five years' standing, and the chiefs of political departments of divisions and brigades Party members of three years' standing.
69. The political organs must maintain close contact with the local Party committees by means of the constant participation of the leaders of the political organs and the military commissars in the local Party committees, as well as by means of regular reports made to the Party Committees by the chiefs of the,political organs and by the military commissars on the political work in the military units, and by the political departments on the railways.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ XI __ALPHA_LVL3__ Party Groups in Non-Party Organizations70. At all congresses and conferences and in all elected bodies of Soviet, trade union, cooperative and other mass organizations where there are not less than three Party members, Party groups are 481 formed whose task it is to strengthen the influence of the Party in every respect and,to carry out the Party policy among the non-Party people, to strengthen Party and state discipline, to combate bureaucra cy, and to keep a check on the way Party and Soviet directions are fulfilled.
The group elects a secretary for its current work.
71. The Party groups are subordinated to the appropriate Party organizations (Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. [B.], Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Union Republic, territorial committee, regional committee, area committee, city committee, or district committee).
In all questions the groups must strictly and unswervingly be guided by the decisions of the leading Party organs.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ XII __ALPHA_LVL3__ Penalties for Violation of Party Discipline72. The maintenance of Party unity, relentless measures against the slightest attempt at double-dealing, factional struggle or splits, and the observance of Party and state discipline are primary duties of all Party members and of all Party organizations.
73. Decisions of Party and Soviet centres must be carried out promptly and accurately. Failure to carry out decisions of a higher organization, or any other offense regarded as culpable by the public opinion of the Party, entails: for organizations----censure and a general re-registration> (dissolution of the organization); for individual Party anembers---censure in one form or another (admonition, reprimand, etc.), public censure, temporary removal from responsible Party and Soviet work, expulsion from the P'arty, and expulsion from the iParty with notification of the offense to the administrative and judicial authorities.
74. In cases of violation of Party or state discipline, or the revival or commission of double-dealing and factionalism on the part of a member of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), the Central Committee has the right to expel him from the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.), and, as an extreme measure, to expel him from the Party.
A condition precedent to the application of such an extreme measure to a member or alternate member of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U. (B.) must be the convocation of a plenary meeting of the 482 Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) to which all alternate members of the Central Committee are invited. If a two-thirds majority of such a general- assembly of the most responsible leaders of the Party deem it necessary to expel the member of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) from the Central Committee or from the Party, this measure shall be put into effect immediately.
__NUMERIC_LVL3__ XIII __ALPHA_LVL3__ Party Funds75. The funds of the Party and of its organizations consist of membership dues, revenue from- Party enterprises and other items of revenue.
76. The membership dues payable monthly by Party members and candidate members are as follows:
Monthly wages
Dues
Up to 100 rubles ........ . 20 kopeks
from 101 to 150 rubles ....... 60 kopeks
from 151 to 200 rubles . ......
1.00 ruble
from 201 to 250 rubles.......
1.50 ruble
from 251 to 300 rubles......
2.00 rubles
from 301 to 500 rubles.......
2°/«
} of earnings
over 500 rubles.........
3%
The membership dues of Party members and candidate members who have no fixed earnings are determined by the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
77. Persons on admission to the Party as candidate members pay an entrance fee amounting to two per cent of their monthly wage.
[483] __ALPHA_LVL2__ COMPOSITION OF THE COMMISSION TO REVISE THE 1. Stalin (Chairman)
2. Andreyev^^*^^
3. Baghirov
4. Benedictov
5. Beria
6. Voznessensky
7. Voroshilov
8. Vyshinsky
9. Donskoy
10. Zhdanov
11. Kalinin
12. Kaganovich, L. M.
13 Korotchenko
14. Lozovsky
15. Malenkov
16. Manuilsky
17. Mekhlis
18. Mikoyan
19. Mitin
20. Molotov
21. Pospelov
22. Skvortsov
23. Khrushchov
24. Shvernik
25. Shcherbakov
26. Yussupov
27. Yaroslavsky
^^*^^ Note: The names are listed in the order of the Russian alphabet.---Tr.
[484] __ALPHA_LVL2__ COMPOSITION OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OFMembers
1. Andreyev, A. A.
2. Andrianov, V. M.
3. Antselovich, N. M.
4. Ba'ghirov, "M. J. A.
5. Badayev, A. E.
6. Benedictov, I. A.
7. Beria,L.P.
8. Borkov, G. A.
9. Budyonny, S. M.
10. Bulganin, N. A.
11. Burmistenko, M. A.
12. Vannikov, B. L.
13. Vakhrushev, V. V.
14. Voznessensky, N. A.
15. Voroshilov, K. E.
16. Vyshinsky, A. Y.
17. Dvinsky, B. A.
18. Donskoy, V. A.
19. Efremov, A. I.
20. Zhdanov, A. A.
21. Zadionchenko, S. B.
22. Zakharov,S.E.
23. Zveryev, A. G.
24. Zemlyachka, R. S,
25. Kaganovich, L. M.-
26. Kaganovich, M. M.
27. Kalinin, M. I.
28. Komiets, L. R.
29. Korotchenko, D. S.
30. Kossyghin, A. N.
31. Kuznetsov, A. A.
32. Kuznetsov, N. G.
33. Kulik, G. I.
34. Litvinov, M. M.
35. Likhachov, I. A.
36. Lozovsky, S. A.
37. Lyubavin,P.M.
38. Malenkov, G. M.
39. Malyshev, V. A.
40. Manuilsky, D. Z.
41. Merkulov, V. N.
42. Merkulov, F. A.
43. Mekhlis, L. Z.
44. Mikoyan, A. I.
45. Mitin, M. B.
46. Mikhailov,N.A.
47. Molotov, V. M.
48. Nikitin, V. D.
49. NikolayeVa, C. /.
50. Pegov, N. M.
51. Pervukhin, M. G.
52. Ponomarenko, P. K.
53. Poskrebyshev, A. N.
54. Pospelov, P. N.
55. Potemkin, V. P.
56. Rogov, 1. V.
57. Sedin, I. K.
5S. Skvortsov, N. A.
59. Stalin, J. V-.
GO. Tevossian, I. T.
61. Timoshenko, S. C.
62. Fadeyev, A. A.
63. Khrushchov,N.S.
64. Shakhurin, A. I.
65. Shvernik, N. M.
66. Shkiryatov, M. F.
67. Stern, G. M.
68. Shchadenko, E. A.
69. Shcherbakou, A. S.
70. Yussupov, U.
71. Yaroslavsky, E.
Alternate Members
1. Alemassov, A. M.
2. Antonov, D. I.
3. Arutinov, G. A.
4-. Bagayev, S. J.
5. Bakradze, V. M.
6. Biryukov, N. I.
7. Boytsov, I. P.
8. Weinberg, G. D.
9. Vlassov, I. A.
10. Gvishiani, M. M.
11. Goglidze, S. A.
12. Gorkin, A. F. '
13. Gromov, G. P.
14. Gussarov, N. I.
15. Dekanozov, V. G.
16. Denissov, M. F.
17. Doronin, P. I.
18. Dubrovsky, A. A.
19. Zhavoronkov,V.G.
20. Zhemchuzhina, P. S.
21. Zhuravlev, V. P.
22. Zotov, V. P.
23. Ignatov, N. G.
24. Ignatyev, S. P.
25. Iskanderov, A. B.
26. Kartashov, K. K.
27. Kaftanov,S.V.
28. Kachalin, K. I.
29. Kobulov,B.Z.
30. Kovalyov, M. P.
31. Kolybanov, A. G.
32. Komarov, P. T.
33. Konyev, I. S.
34. Kruglov, S. N.
35. Kulakov, P. C.
36. Loktionov, A. D.
37. Mak,arov, I. G.
38. Maslennikov, I. I.
39. Meretskov, K. A.
40. Nevyezhin, N. I.
41. Nikishov,I.F.
42. Pavlov, D. G.
43. Paltsev, G. N.
44. Patolichev, N. S.
45. Popkov, P. S.
46. Popov, G. M.
47. Pronin, V. P.
48. Rastyoghin, G. S.
49. Savchenko, G. K.
50. Samokhvalov, A. I.
51. Seleznyev, P. I.
52. Sergeyev, I. P.
55.
Serdyuk, Z. T.
54. Smushkevich, J. V.
55. Sasnin, L. A.
56. Starostin, M. 1.
57. Starchenko, V. F.
58. Storozhev, J. V.
59. Feklenko, N. V.
60. Frolkov, A. A.
61. Khokhlov, I. S.
62. Charkviani, K. N.
63. Chernoussov, B. N.
64. Chuyanov, A. S.
65. Shagimardanov, F. V.
66. Shaposhnikov, B. M.
67. Shtykov, T. F.
68. Yartsev, V. V.
COMPOSITION OF THE CENTRAL AUDITING
COMMISSION ELECTED BY THE EIGHTEENTH
PARTY CONGRESS
1. Abdurakhmanov, A.
2. Andrienko, A. A.
3. Anoshin, I. S.
4. Boitsov, V. I.
5. Bulatov, V. S.
6. Vagov, A. V.
7. Vladimirsky, M. F.
8. Vqlkov,A.A.
9. Grekova, N. G.
10. Denissenko, V. M.
11. Dukehky, S. S.
12. Ignatyev, S. D.
13. Izotov, N. A.
14. Kabanov, A. F.
15. Kanunnikov, M. Y.
16. Kvassov,M.E.
17. Kisselyev, V. A.
18. Kisselyev, K. V.
19. Krivonoss, P. F.
20. Kudryavtsev, A. V.
21. Kuznetsov, 7. A.
22. Kuznetsov, F. F.
23. Kuliev,T.I.
24. Kulatov,T.
25. Kurbanov, M.
26. Lavrentyev, P. V.
27. Linkun, N. I.
28. Lobanov, P. P.
29. Lukin, S. G.
30. Lyubimov, A. V.
31. Melnikov, A. N.
32. Mishakova, 0. P.
33. Mishchenko, G. K.
34. Moskatov, P. G.
35. Murugov, /. V.
36. Ogorodnikov,G.P.
37. Piruzian, A. S.
38. Protopopov, D. Z.
39. Sajaya, A. N.
40. Silkin, G. P.
41. Skrynnikov, S. E.
42. Smirnov, P. V.
43. Stepanenko, I. L.
44. Suslov, M. A.
45. Tarassov, S. N.
46. Undassynov, N.
47. Khudai-Berghenov, A.
48. Tsanava, L. F.
49. Chubin, Y. A.
50. Shatalin,N.N.
PLENARY MEETING OF THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.)
On March 22, 1939, a Plenary Meeting of the newly-elected Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.) was held.
The Plenary Meeting elected the executive bodies of the Central Committee, as follows:
1. Political Bureau of. the Central Committee: A. Andreyev, K. Voroshilov, A. Zhdanov, L. Kaganovich, M. Kalinin, A. Mikoyan, V. Molotov, J. Stalin, N. Khrushchov.
Alternate Members: L. Beria, N. Shvernik.
2. Secretariat of the Central Committee: A. Andreyev, A. Zhdanov, G. Malenkov, J. Stalin.
3. Organisation Bureau of the Central Committee: A. Andreyev, A. Zhdanov, L. Kaganovich, G. Malenkov, L. Mekhlis, N. Mikhailov, J. Stalin, N. Shvernik, A. Shcherbakov.
The Plenary Meeting of the Central, Corrtmittee elected A, Andreyev Chairman of the Party Control Commission of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U.(B.).
[488] __ALPHA_LVL0__ The End. [END] ~ [489]