Collection of Speeches
by General Secretary of the CPSU
Central Committee, L. I. BREZHNEV
(March 1971---December 1972)
JVOVOSTI PRESS AGENCY PUBLISHING HOUSE MOSCOW, 1975
CONTENTS
of the
o
102 104
Delegations at the 24th CPsTcon
- ioth c
Part,
109111 117
Speech on Red Square. Moscow, May 1, 1971
,
Soviet of the Gen s™™'^^1^^^ of Georgia and the
th C™^* ^ commyuni;t Parfyof Czechoslovakia
Speech at the Auto-Praga Plant. May 27> 1971
120134 143
151 165
174 176 179 186
8th Congress the
.ths
Unity Party of Germany June 9 197, '~^^8^^'h C°ngrCSS of the Speech Made in Belgrade During a Visit [o Yugoslavia. Sep(ember ^
in Belgrade
Speech Made at the Airport Before Leaving Yugoslavia.
September 25,
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© Novosti Press Agency Publishing House, 1975 Editing completed on July 23, 1975
.
Speech at the Elysee Palace in Paris. October 25 1971
3ttheGr-d Trianon ' Palace in Versail,es.
187189 197
199 203
205 209
2102i2
Speech at the Town Hall, Paris. October 26, 1971
October 27, ai9Snner ^ * H~ of «« President of France.
Sober 27, ^^ M~F1^ at 4 Rue Marie-Rose in Paris.
«VcUe^8:hie9°7ni ^ ^ PrefeCUlre °f B"Uches-du-Rh6ne DepartSpeech Over French Television. October 29, 1971
Speech Made at a Dinner Given by the CC SUPG in Berlin During a Friendly Visit to the German Democratic Republic. November 1, 1971 Speech at the Sixth Congress of the Polish United Workers' Party.
December 7, 1971
..........
Speech at the Reception Given on the Termination of the Sixth Congress of the Polish United Workers' Party in Warsaw. December
11, 1971 .............
Speech at the 15th Congress of the Trade Unions of the USSR. March
20, 1972 . ............
Speech at the Dinner in the Grand Kremlin Palace in Honour of Comrade Josip Broz Tito, President of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and Chairman of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia. June 5, 1972..........
Speech at the Dinner in the Grand Kremlin Palace in Honour of Comrade Fidel Castro Ruz, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba and Prime Minister of the Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Cuba, June 27, 1972 Speech at the Gala Reception Held in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses on the Occasion of the 55th Anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution. November 7, 1972.......
Speech at the Dinner in the Grand Kremlin Palace in Honour of the Party and Government Delegation of the People's Republic of
Bulgaria. November 13, 1972........
Speech in Budapest at the Presentation of the Order of Lenin to Comrade Janos Kadar, First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party. November 27, 1972 Address to a Meeting of Soviet-Hungarian Friendship at the Csepel
Works in Budapest. November 30, 1972......
Report at a Gala Joint Meeting of the CPSU Central Committee, the USSR Supreme Soviet and the RSFSR Supreme Soviet, in the Kremlin Palace of Congresses. December 21, 1972
......
Speech at the Reception in the Kremlin on the Occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the Formation of the USSR. December 22, 1972
218 222
230 232
253257 262 2G4
269 272280 327
Report of the Central Committee of the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union to the
24th Congress of the CPSU
March 30, 1971
Comrade delegates, clear guests,
Five years have passed since the 23rd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
These have been years of our people's intense labour. In implementing the plans outlined by the Party, the Soviet people have scored great successes along all the main lines of communist construction.
These have been years in which our socialist economy took another great stride forward. The volume of industrial production has increased considerably. Agriculture has been growing steadily. New frontiers have been reached in the development of science and technology, and their latest achievements were being applied on an ever growing scale. On this basis we have succeeded in materially advancing in the direction which ultimately expresses the main meaning of our Party's activity---towards further raising the level of the welfare and culture of the whole Soviet people.
These have been years of successful development of socialist social relations and Soviet democracy, years of the further flourishing of the fraternal friendship of the peoples of the USSR and of considerable strengthening of the political and defence might of our great country---the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
In the sphere of international development these have been years of great socio-political changes, years of sharp confrontation between the forces of peace, freedom and progress, and the forces of oppression, reaction and aggression. More than once the horizons of the globe have been clouded with the danger of war, but
on every occasion imperialist encroachments met with resolute
rebuff.
The Soviet Union and the fraternal socialist countries have made a hig and active contribution to the struggle for peace and the security of nations. Our country's international positions have become even more secure, and the role of the world socialist system has increased. The great alliance of the three main revolutionary forces of our day---socialism, the international workingclass movement, and the peoples' national liberation struggle---has continued to grow and gain in depth.
The past five-year period has been one of further growth and strengthening of our great Leninist Party, further consolidation of its ties with the people, and enhancement of its leading role in the whole life of Soviet society. In these years, the Party has had to tackle a great many formidable tasks. Summing up the experience accumulated in communist construction, the Party has formulated a principled and realistic policy which has been met with approval and unanimously supported by the whole Soviet
people.
These have been years of tremendous political upswing and labour enthusiasm of the Soviet people on the occasion of two great anniversaries---the 50lh anniversary of the October Revolution, and the centenary of the birth of V. I. Lenin---years of ever more active participation by broad masses of working people in the practical implementation of the plans outlined by the Party. All the Soviet people regard the 24th Congress of the Communist Party as an outstanding event in their lives, and have marked it with concrete deeds and fresh big achievements.
At its 24th Congress, our Leninist Party finds itself full of vigour, enriched with new experience and monolithically united, fully aware of the scale and importance of what has already been achieved, and confident in ils strength and the correctness of the prospects mapped out for our further advance.
Now comrades, allow me to deal with the results of the work done by the Central Committee and the whole Party in the period under review, and of some of the CC's considerations concerning the Parly's policy and the country's development over the next few years.
I.
The International Position of the USSR. The CPSU's Foreign Policy Activity
Comrades, our internal development is closely connected with the situation in the world arena. In view of this the Party's Central Committee has devoted much attention to international problems. Plenary Meetings of the CC have repeatedly considered the most important and pressing problems of the USSR's foreign policy, and the CPSU's activity in the communist movement.
The Soviet Union is a peace-loving state, and this is determined by the very nature of our socialist system. The goals of Soviet foreign policy, as formulated by the 23rd Congress of the CPSU, consist in ensuring, together with other socialist countries, favourable international conditions for the construction of socialism and communism; in consolidating the unity and cohesion of the socialist countries, their friendship and brotherhood; supporting the national liberation movement and engaging in all-round co-operation with the young developing states; consistently standing up for the principle of peaceful coexistence between states with different social systems, giving a resolute rebuff to the aggressive forces of imperialism, and safeguarding mankind from another world war.
The whole of the CC's practical activity in the sphere of foreign policy has been designed to achieve these goals.
1. FOR THE FURTHER DEVELOPMENT OF THE FRIENDSHIP AND CO-OPERATION OF THE SOCIALIST COUNTRIES
The CC's attention has been constantly centred on questions of further cohesion and development of the world socialist system, and relations with the fraternal socialist countries and their Communist Parties.
The world socialist system has a quarter-century behind it. From the standpoint of development of revolutionary theory and practice these have been exceptionally fruitful years. The socialist world has given the communist and working-class movement experience which is of tremendous and truly historic importance. This experience shows:
Socialism, which is firmly established in the states now constituting the world socialist system, has proved its great viability in the historical contest with capitalism.
The formation and strengthening of the world socialist system has been a powerful accelerator of historical progress which was
started by the Great October Revolution. Fresh prospects have opened up for the triumph of socialism all over the world; life has provided confirmation of the conclusion drawn by the 1969 International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties that "the world socialist system is the decisive force in the anti-imperialist
struggle''.
The world socialist system has been making a great contribution to the fulfilment of a task of such vital importance for all the peoples as the prevention of another world war. It is safe to say that many of the imperialist aggressors' plans were frustrated thanks to the existence of the world socialist system and its firm
action.
Successes in socialist construction largely depend on the correct combination of the general and the nationally specific in social development. Not only are we now theoretically aware but also have been convinced in practice that the way to socialism and its main features are determined by the general regularities, which are inherent in the development of all the socialist countries. We are also aware that the effect of the general regularities is manifested in different forms consistent with concrete historical conditions and national specifics. It is impossible to build socialism without basing oneself on general regularities or taking account of the concrete historical specifics of each country. Nor is it possible without a consideration of both these factors correctly to develop relations between the socialist states.
The experience accumulated over the quarter-century also makes it possible to take a more profound and more realistic approach in assessing and determining the ways of overcoming objective and subjective difficulties which arise in the construction of the new society and the establishment of the new, socialist type of inter-state relations. Given a correct policy of the MarxistLeninist Parties, a common social system, and the identity of basic interests and purposes of the peoples of the socialist countries it is possible successfully to overcome these difficulties and steadily to advance the cause of developing and strengthening the world socialist system.
The past five-year period has seen a considerable contribution to the treasure-house of the collective experience of the fraternal countries and Parties. In the last five years, the economic potential of the socialist states has increased substantially, the political foundations of socialism have been strengthened, the people's living standards have been raised, and culture and science have been further developed.
At the same time, it is known that some difficulties and complications have continued to appear in the socialist world, and this has also had an effect on the development of relations between individual states and the Soviet Union. However, this has not changed the dominant tendency of strengthening friendship and
cohesion of the socialist countries. On the whole, our co-operation with the fraternal countries has been successfully developing and strengthening in every sphere.
The CPSU has attached special importance to developing cooperation with the Communist Parties of the fraternal countries. This co-operation, enriching us with each other's experience, has enabled us jointly to work on the fundamental problems of socialist and communst construction, to find the most rational forms of economic relations, collectively to lay down a common line in foreign affairs, and to exchange opinion on questions relating to the work in the sphere of ideology and culture.
The period under review was marked by important successes in co-ordinating the foreign-policy activity of the fraternal Parties and states. The most important international problems and events in this period were considered collectively by the representatives of socialist countries on various levels.
The Warsaw Treaty Organisation has been and continues to be the main centre for co-ordinating the foreign-policy activity of the fraternal countries.
The Warsaw Treaty countries displayed the initiative of putting forward a full-scale programme for strengthening peace in Europe, which is pivoted on the demand that the immutability of the existing state borders should be secured. The Political Consultative Committee has devoted several of its sittings to formulating and concretising this programme.
The Warsaw Treaty countries can also undoubtedly count among their political assets the fact that the plans which had existed within NATO to give the FRG militarists access to nuclear weapons have not been realised.
Joint efforts by the socialist states have also made it possible to achieve substantial progress in solving a task of such importance for stabilising the situation in Europe as the strengthening of the international positions of the German Democratic Republic. The so-called Hallstein Doctrine has been defeated. The GDR has already been recognised by 27 states, and this process is bound to continue.
Active and consistent support from the Soviet Union and other socialist countries is vitally important for the struggle of the peoples of Vietnam and the other countries of Indochina against the imperialist interventionists. The steps taken by the socialist states in the Middle East have become one of the decisive factors which have frustrated the imperialist plans of overthrowing the progressive regimes in the Arab countries,
In the United Nations and other international bodies, the socialist countries, acting together, have put forward many proposals of key international importance. These proposals have been in the focus of world attention.
As a result of the collective formulation and implementation of a number of measures in recent years, the military organisation of the Warsaw Treaty has been further improved. The armed forces of the allied powers are in a state of high readiness and are capable of guaranteeing the peaceful endeavour of the fraternal
peoples.
In short, comrades, the socialist countries' multilateral political co-operation is becoming ever closer and more vigorous. We set ourselves definite aims and work jointly to achieve them. This is naturally of tremendous importance, especially in the present conditions of the contest between the two world social systems.
Of equal importance is co-operation in the economic sphere, and extension and deepening of national-economic ties between the socialist countries. The period under review has also been fruitful in this respect.
Let us turn to the facts.
The Soviet Union and the fraternal states seek to help each other in every way to develop their national economies. In the last five years, over 300 industrial and agricultural projects have been built or reconstructed in the socialist countries with our technical assistance. We have been supplying our friends with many types of industrial products on mutually advantageous terms. The Soviet Union has met 70, and more, per cent of the import requirements in some key types of raw materials and fuel of the CMEA countries and Cuba, and also to a considerable extent those of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Korean People's Democratic Republic. In the past five-year period, our national economy, for its part, has received from the CMEA countries equipment for 54 chemical plants. Over 38 per cent of the seagoing tonnage which our merchant navy has received in that period was made at our friends' shipyards. The CMEA countries are taking part through their investments in developing raw material and fuel branches of the Soviet economy, and in enlarging the capacities for making metal, mineral fertilisers and pulp. We have also been receiving many consumer goods from the fraternal countries.
The USSR and the other CMEA countries arrange their economic relations on a long-term basis. In particular, the fraternal countries have co-ordinated their national-economic plans for 1971-1975. In the last few years, active work has been continued in developing the organisational structure and technical basis for multilateral economic co-operation.
The second section of the Druzhba oil pipeline is being laid. In the first year of its operation, 1964, it carried 8.3 million tons of oil, and in 1975 the fraternal countries will receive almost 50 million tons of oil. A gas pipeline of unique dimensions is being laid to carry natural gas from Siberia to the country's European part. This will also help to increase gas deliveries to Czechoslovakia i and Poland, and to start supplying gas to the GDR, Bulgaria and
10Hungary. The Mir integrated power grids have been yielding great economies for the CMEA countries. The International Bank for Economic Co-operation has been operating successfully, and a common investment bank of the CMEA countries recently started operations. Other forms of multilateral ties are also being strengthened.
All this has produced its results, helping to make social production more efficient, and to develop the national economy of each of our countries at a rapid pace. In the past five-year period, the CMEA countries' industrial production increased by 49 per cent. Trade between them has also been growing.
However, like other members of CMEA, we believe that the possibilities of the socialist division of labour are not yet being fully used. Practice has led us up to this common conclusion: it is necessary to deepen specialisation and co-operation of production, and to tie in our national-economic plans more closely, that is, to advance along the way of the socialist countries' economic integration. Comrades, this is an important and necessary endeavour.
The economic integration of the socialist countries is a new and complex process. It implies a new and broader approach to many economic questions, and the ability to find the most rational solutions, meeting the interests not only of the given country but of all the co-operating participants. It requires firm orientation on the latest scientific and technical achievements, and the most profitable and technically advanced lines of production.
That is the approach the CPSU intends to foster among workers in our planning and economic bodies. In this connection consideration should also apparently be given to the steps that would provide every unit of our economic system with an incentive to develop long-term economic ties with the fraternal countries.
In the period between the 23rd and the 24th Congresses, our Party has displayed much concern for strengthening bilateral relations between the Soviet Union and the socialist countries.
Close and diverse co-operation, friendship and cordiality are characteristic of our relations with the Warsaw Treaty countries---• Bulgaria, Hungary, the German Democratic Republic, Poland, Rumania and Czechoslovakia.
New treaties of friendship, co-operation and mutual assistance have been concluded with Bulgaria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Rumania. Together with the treaties with the GDR, Poland and Mongolia, which came into force earlier, together with the other bilateral treaties between the fraternal countries, these documents constitute a comprehensive system of mutual allied commitments of a new, socialist type.
Our friendship with the Polish People's Republic is unshakeable. We note with deep satisfaction that the difficulties which arose in fraternal Poland have been overcome. The Polish United Workers' Party is taking steps to have its ties with the working
11class and all other working people strengthened, and the positions of socialism in the country consolidated. From the bottom of their hearts, the Communists of the Soviet Union wish their Polish friends the very greatest of success.
Our Party, and the Soviet people have relations of socialist solidarity and strong and militant friendship with the Working People's Party of Vietnam and the Democratic Republic of Vietnam. Following the precepts of Ho Chi Minh, great patriot and revolutionary, the Vietnamese people have raised high the banner of socialism and are fearlessly confronting the imperialist aggressors. The Democratic Republic of Vietnam may be sure that in its armed struggle and its peaceful endeavour it can continue to rely on the Soviet Union's fraternal support.
Over these years, the Central Committee has devoted constant attention to strengthening co-operation with the Republic of Cuba and the Communist Party of Cuba. As a result of joint efforts, considerable successes have been achieved in developing SovietCuban relations. The peoples of the Soviet Union and of Cuba arc comrades-in-arms in a common struggle, and their friendship
is firm.
For half a century now, the CPSU and the Soviet state have had bonds of strong and time-tested friendship with the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Party and the Mongolian People's Republic. The Soviet Union is a true friend and ally of socialist Mongolia, and actively supports the efforts of our Mongolian friends aimed at solving major economic problems and strengthening their country's international position.
In the last few years, our ties with the Korean People's Democratic Republic and the Korean Party of Labour have grown, and this, we are sure, meets the interests of the peoples of both countries. The Soviet Union has supported and continues to support the proposals of the KPDR Government on the country's peaceful, democratic unification, and the Korean people's demands for a withdrawal of US troops from the south of Korea.
In the period under review, Soviet-Yugoslav relations have continued to develop. The Soviet people want to see socialism in Yugoslavia strengthened, and her ties with the socialist community growing stronger. We stand for Soviet-Yugoslav co-operation, and for developing contacts between our Parties.
Concerning our relations with the People's Republic of China. It will be recalled that the Chinese leaders have put forward an ideological-political platform of their own which is incompatible with Leninism on the key questions of international life and the world communist movement, and have demanded that we should abandon the line of the 20th Congress and the Programme of the CPSU. They unfolded an intensive and hostile propaganda campaign against our Party and country, made territorial claims on
12the Soviet Union, and in the spring and summer of 1969 brought things to the point of armed incidents along the border.
Our Party has resolutely opposed the attempts to distort the Marxist-Leninist teaching, and to split the international communist movement and the ranks of the fighters against imperialism. Displaying restraint and refusing to be provoked, the CC CPSU and the Soviet Government have done their utmost to bring about a normalisation of relations with the People's Republic of China. In the last eighteen months, as a result of the initiative displayed on our part, there have been signs of some normalisation in relations between the USSR and the PRC. A meeting of the heads sof government of the two countries took place in September 1969, and this was followed by negotiations in Peking between government delegations on a settlement of the border issues. These negotiations are proceeding slowly, and it goes without saying that their favourable completion calls for a constructive attitude not only of one side.
An exchange of ambassadors took place between the USSR and the PRC at the end of last year. After a considerable interval, trade agreements have been signed and trade has somewhat increased. These are useful steps. We are prepared to continue to act in this direction.
Rut on the other hand, comrades, we cannot, of course, fail to
see that the anti-Soviet line in China's propaganda and policy is
being continued, and that the 9th Congress of the CPC has written
this line, which is hostile to the Soviet Union, into its decisions.
What can be said in this context?
We resolutely reject the slanderous inventions concerning the policy of our Party and our state which are being spread from Peking and instilled into the minds of the Chinese people. It is all the more absurd and harmful to sow dissent between China and the USSR considering that this is taking place in a situation in which the imperialists have been stepping up their aggressive actions against the freedom-loving peoples. More than ever before the situation demands cohesion and joint action by all the antiimperialist, revolutionary forces, instead of fanning hostility between such states as the USSR and China.
We shall never forsake the national interests of the Soviet state. The CPSU will continue tirelessly to work for the cohesion of the socialist countries and the world communist movement on a Marxist-Leninist basis. At the same time, our Party and the Soviet Government are deeply convinced that an improvement of relations between the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China would be in line with the fundamental, long-term interests of both countries, the interests of socialism, the freedom of the peoples, and stronger peace. That is why we are prepared in every way to help not only to normalise relations but also to restore neighbourliness and friendship between the Soviet Union and the
13People's Republic of China and express the confidence that this will eventually be achieved.
Such is our principled stand. We have repeatedly stated it, are firmly committed to it, and are backing it up in practice.
As regards Albania, we are prepared, as in the past, to restore normal relations with her. This would be beneficial to both countries and to the common interests of the socialist states.
Comrades, the political crisis in Czechoslovakia has been fairly prominent in the international events of recent years. There is apparently no need here to set out the factual side of the matter, which is well known. Let us deal only with some of the conclusions drawn from what has taken place which we believe to be the most
essential.
The Czechoslovak events were a fresh reminder that in the countries which have taken the path of socialist construction the internal anti-socialist forces, whatever remained of them, may, in certain conditions, become active and even mount direct counterrevolutionary action in the hope of support from outside, from imperialism, which, for its part, is always prepared to form blocs with such forces.
The danger of Right-wing revisionism, which seeks, on the pretext of ``improving'' socialism, to destroy the revolutionary essence of Marxism-Leninism, and paves the way for the penetration of bourgeois ideology, has been fully brought out in this connection.
The Czechoslovak events showed very well how important it is constantly to strengthen the Party's leading role in socialist society, steadily to improve the forms and methods of Party leadership, and to display a creative Marxist-Leninist approach to the solution of pressing problems of socialist development.
It was quite clear to us that this was not only an attempt on the part of imperialism and its accomplices to overthrow the socialist system in Czechoslovakia. It was an attempt to strike in this way at the position of socialism in Europe as a whole, and to create favourable conditions for a subsequent onslaught against the socialist world by the most aggressive forces of imperialism. In view of the appeals by Party and state leaders, Communists and working people of Czechoslovakia, and considering the danger posed to the socialist gains in that country, we and the fraternal socialist countries then jointly took a decision to render internationalist assistance to Czechoslovakia in defence of socialism. In the extraordinary conditions created by the forces of imperialism and counter-revolution, we were bound to do so by our class duty, loyalty to socialist internationalism, and the concern for the interests of our states and the future of socialism and peace in Europe. You will recall that in its document, "Lessons of the Crisis Development", a plenary meeting of the CC of the Communist Party
14of Czechoslovakia gave this assessment of the importance of the fraternal states' collective assistance (I quote):
``The entry of the allied troops of the five socialist countries into Czechoslovakia was an act of international solidarity, meeting both the common interests of the Czechoslovakian working people and the interests of the international working class, the socialist community and the class interests of the international communist movement. This internationalist act saved the lives of thousands of men, ensured internal and external conditions for peaceful and tranquil labour, strengthened the Western borders of the socialist camp, and blasted the hopes of the imperialist circles for a revision of the results of the Second World War.''
We fully agree with the conclusion drawn by the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. Life has once again provided convincing evidence that the fraternal unity of the socialist countries is the most reliable barrier against the forces trying to attack, and weaken, the socialist camp, to undermine and invalidate the working people's socialist gains. The peoples of the socialist countries have clearly demonstrated to the whole world that they will not give up their revolutionary gains, and that the borders of the socialist community are immutable and inviolable.
We are sincerely glad that the Communists of Czechoslovakia have successfully stood the trials that fell to their lot. Today the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia is advancing towards its 14th Congress, which we are sure will be a new and important stage in strengthening the positions of socialism in Czechoslovakia.
Comrades, the present-day socialist world, with its successes and prospects, with all its problems, is still a young and growing social organism, where not everything has settled and where much still bears the marks of earlier historical epochs. The socialist world is forging ahead and is continuously improving. Its development naturally runs through struggle between the new and the old. through the resolution of internal contradictions. The experience that has been accumulated helps the fraternal Parties to find correct and timely resolution of the contradictions and confidently to advance along the path indicated by Marx, Engels and Lenin, the great teachers of the proletariat.
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union has regarded and continues to regard as its internationalist duty in every way to promote the further growth of the might of the world socialist system. Our stand is that the co-operation between the fraternal countries should grow ever more diverse and gain in depth, that it should involve ever broader masses of working people, and that each other's concrete experience should be more fundamentally studied at every level of state, social, economic and cultural life. We want to see every fraternal country a flourishing state, harmoniously combining rapid economic, scientific and technical growth with a flowering of socialist culture and rising living stan-
15dards for the working people. We want the world socialist system to be a well-knit family of nations, building and defending the new society together, and mutually enriching each other with experience and knowledge, a family, strong and united, which the people of the world would regard as the prototype of the future world community of free nations.
Allow me to assure our friends, our brothers and our comradesin-arms in the socialist countries that the Communist Party of the Soviet Union will spare no effort to attain this lofty goal!
2. IMPERIALISM, ENEMY OF THE PEOPLES AND SOCIAL PROGRESS. THE PEOPLES AGAINST IMPERIALISM
Comrades, at its 23rd Congress and then in a number of its documents our Party has already given a comprehensive assessment of modern imperialism. A Marxist-Leninist analysis of its presentday features is contained in the material of the 1969 International Communist Meeting. Allow me, therefore, in the light of the experience of the last few years to deal only with some of the basic points which we must take account of in our policy.
The features of contemporary capitalism largely spring from the fact that it is trying to adapt itself to the new situation in the world. In the conditions of the confrontation with socialism, the ruling circles of the capitalist countries are afraid more than they have ever been of the class struggle developing into a massive revolutionary movement. Hence, the bourgeoisie's striving to use more camouflaged forms of exploitation and oppression of the working people, and its readiness now and again to agree to partial reforms in order to keep the masses under its ideological and political control as far as possible. The monopolies have been making extensive use of scientific and technical achievements to fortify their positions, to enhance the efficiency and accelerate the pace of production, and to intensify the exploitation and oppression of
the working people.
However, adaptation to the new conditions does not mean that capitalism has been stabilised as a system. The general crisis of capitalism has continued to deepen.
Even the most developed capitalist states are not free from grave economic upheavals. The USA, for instance, has been floundering in one of its economic crises i'or almost two years now. The last few years have also been marked by a grave crisis in the capitalist monetary and financial system. The simultaneous growth of inflation and unemployment has become a permanent feature. There are now almost eight million unemployed in the developed
capitalist countries.
The contradictions between the imperialist states have not been eliminated either by the processes of integration or the imperialists'
16class concern for pooling their efforts in fighting against the socialist world. By the early 1970s, the main centres of imperialist rivalry have become clearly visible: these are the USA---Western Europe (above all, the six Common Market countries)---Japan. The economic and political competitive struggle between them has been growing ever more acute. The import bans imposed by official US agencies on an ever growing number of products from Europe and Japan, and the European countries' efforts to limit their exploitation by US capital are only some of the signs of this struggle.
In the past five-year period, imperialist foreign policy has provided fresh evidence that imperialism has not ceased to be reactionary and aggressive.
In this context, one must deal above all with US imperialism, which in the last few years has reasserted its urge to act as a kind of guarantor and protector of the international system of exploitation and oppression. It seeks to dominate everywhere, interferes in the affairs of other peoples, high-handedly tramples on their legitimate rights and sovereignty, and seeks by force, bribery and economic penetration to impose its will on states and whole areas of the world.
Needless to say, the forces of war and aggression also exist in the other imperialist countries. In West Germany, these are the revanchists, who have been increasingly ganging up with the neoNazis; in Britain, these are the executioners of Northern Ireland, the suppliers of arms to the South African racists, and the advocates of the aggressive US policy; in Japan these are the militarists who, in defiance of the constitution, which prohibits war "for all time", seek once again to push the country onto the path of expansion and aggression.
Another fact, comrades, that should also be borne in mind is that since the war militarism in the capitalist world has been growing on an unprecedented scale. This tendency has been intencifled in the recent period. In 1970 alone, the NATO countries invested 103 thousand million dollars in war preparations. Militarisation has acquired the most dangerous nature in the USA. In the last five years that country has spent almost 400 thousand million dollars for military purposes.
The imperialists have been systematically plundering the peoples of dozens of countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Every year, they extract thousands of millions of dollars out of the Third World. Meanwhile, according to a 1970 UN report on the world food situation, 375 million people on these continents live on the brink of death from starvation.
The imperialists are prepared to commit any crime in their efforts to preserve or restore their domination of the peoples in their former colonies or in other countries which are escaping from the grip of capitalist exploitation. The last five-year period has provided much fresh evidence of this. The aggression against the
17Arab states, the colonialist attempts 1o invade Guinea, and the subversive activity against the progressive regimes in Latin America---all this is a constant reminder that the imperialist war against the freedom-loving peoples has not ceased.
And the continuing US aggression against the peoples of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos is the main atrocity committed by the modern colonialists; it is the stamp of ignominy on the United
States.
In the last few years, facts about the war crimes of US imperialism have come to light that have deeply shocked world public opinion. Tragic notoriety fell to the lot of the Vietnamese village of Song My, whose unarmed civilian population, including old men, women and children, was sadistically wiped out by the US
executioners.
It is hard to keep a calm tone when speaking about the atrocities committed by the interventionists, who are armed to the teeth. Hundreds of thousands of tons of napalm have literally scorched into wasteland whole areas of South Vietnam. Almost a million and a half Vietnamese have been poisoned, and many have died as a result of the use of chemical weapons. No honest man, least of all a Communist, can ever reconcile his conscience with what is being done by the US interventionists and their henchmen, who claim to represent "Western civilisation" and the so-called "free world''.
It is a disgrace!
Comrades, we have no doubt at all that the attempts of imperialism to turn the tide of history, to make it flow in its favour, are bound to fail. However, we Communists are well aware that there is no room for passivity or self-complacency. The fighters against capitalist oppression are confronted by the last but the most powerful of the exploiting systems that have ever existed. That is why a long and hard struggle still lies ahead.
But however hard this struggle, it continues to mount and its front is being steadily widened. In the last few years, the fighters against imperialism have written new and glorious pages into the annals of the class battles.
The international working-class movement continues to play, as it has played in the past, the role of time-tested and militant vanguard of the revolutionary forces. The events of the past fiveyear period in the capitalist world have fully borne out the importance of the working class as the chief and strongest opponent of the rule of the monopolies, and as a centre rallying all the antimonopoly forces.
In countries like France and Italy, where the traditions of the class struggle are more developed, and where strong Communist Parties are active, the working people, headed by the working class, have attacked not only individual groups of capitalists, but the whole system of state-monopoly domination. In Britain, the class struggle has reached a state of high tension, and the current strikes
18are comparable in scale and in the numbers involved only with the general strike of 1926. In the USA, working-class action against the monopolies has assumed great scope, and the struggle of the Negro people for equality, and of youth against the war in Vietnam is spreading with unprecedented acerbity. The mass working-class movement in the FRG is gathering momentum. For the first time in many decades, large-scale class clashes have taken place in the Scandinavian countries and in Holland. The socio-political crisis in Spain continues to sharpen. In all the class battles of the recent period, the working people's trade unions, especially those brought together within the World Federation of Trade Unions, have played a considerable and increasingly important role.
The Meeting of the fraternal Parties, it will be recalled, drew the conclusion that the current large-scale battles of the working class are a harbinger of fresh class battles wThich could lead to fundamental social change, to the establishment of the power of the working class in alliance with other sections of the working people.
At the same time, comrades, imperialism is being subjected to ever greater pressure by the forces which have sprung from the national liberation struggle, above all by the young independent and anti-imperialist-minded states of Asia and Africa.
The main thing is that the struggle for national liberation in many countries has in practical terms begun to grow into a struggle against exploitative relations, both feudal and capitalist.
Today, there are already quite a few countries in Asia and Africa which have taken the non-capitalist way of development, that is, the path of building a socialist society in the long term. Many states have now taken this path. Deep-going social changes, which are in the interests of the masses of people, and which lead to a strengthening of national independence, are being implemented in these countries, and the number of these changes has been growing as time goes on.
The offensive by the forces of national and social liberation against domination by imperialism is expressed in various forms. Thus, in the countries oriented towards socialism the property of the imperialist monopolies is being nationalised. This makes it possible to strengthen and develop the slate sector, which is essential as an economic basis for a revolutionary-democratic policy.- In a country like the United Arab Republic, the state sector now accounts for 85 per cent of total industrial production, and in Burma, the state sector controls over 80 per cent of the extractive and almost 60 per cent of the manufacturing industry. New serious steps in nationalising imperialist property have been taken in Algeria. Many foreign enterprises, banks and trading companies have been handed over to the state in Guinea, the Sudan, Somali and Tanzania.
Serious steps have also been taken to solve the land problem,
19which is complicated and has a bearing on the lot of many millions of peasants. Taking the past five-year period alone, important agrarian transformations have been carried out in the UAR and Syria, and have been started in the Sudan and Somali. An agrarian reform has been announced for this year in Algeria. In the People's Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville), all the land and its minerals are now state owned.
Needless to say, it is no easy thing to bring about a radical restructuring of backward social relations on non-capitalist principles, and in an atmosphere of unceasing attacks by the neocolonialists and domestic reactionaries. This makes it all the more important that despite all these difficulties the states taking the socialist orientation have been further advancing along their chosen path. Progressive social change has not advanced to that point in all the former colonies and dependent countries. But the struggle against the forces of reaction and against the henchmen of imperialism is being carried on everywhere, and in some countries the progressive forces have already scored serious gains. One need merely recall, for instance, events like the recent nationalisation of the big banks in India, and the impressive victory scored over the Right-wing forces at the last elections to the House of the People of the Indian Parliament. This is evidence that the masses of people in that country resolutely oppose the reactionary pro-- imperialist forces, and stand for the implementation of a land reform and other socio-economic transformations, and for a policy of peace and friendship in international affairs. Considerable social shifts have taken place in Ceylon and Nigeria.
Despite all the difficulties and even occasional defeats, a diversified process of social change is going on in vast areas of the world. The working people have been scoring important victories in the fight for their rights, for real freedom and for human dignity. The patriots of countries still burdened by the colonial yoke are continuing their courageous fight for liberation.
As to our country, it fully supports this just struggle. The USSR's political and economic co-operation with the liberated countries has been further developed in the last few years. Our trade with them is growing. Dozens of industrial and agricultural enterprises have been built in many countries of Asia and Africa with our participation. We have also been making a contribution to the training of personnel for these countries. All this is being done in the mutual interest.
Great changes have been taking place in a number of Latin American countries. The victory of the Popular Unity Forces in Chile was a most important event. There, for the first time in the history of the continent, the people have secured, by constitutional means, the installation of a government they want and trust. This has incensed domestic reaction and Yankee imperialism, which seek to deprive the Chilean people of their gains. However
20the people of Chile are fully determined to advance along their chosen path. The working people of other Latin American countries have come out in support of Chile's progressive line. The governments of Peru and Bolivia are fighting against enslavement by the US monopolies.
The great Lenin's prediction that the peoples of the colonies and dependent countries, starting with a struggle for national liberation, would go on to fight against the very foundations of the system of exploitation is coming true. And this, of course, is a heavy blow at the positions of capitalism as a whole, as a world social system.
Comrades, success in the struggle against imperialism largely depends on the cohesion of the anti-imperialist forces, above all of the world communist movement, their vanguard. In the last five years, our Party together with the other fraternal Parties, has done much to strengthen this cohesion and the unity of the communist ranks.
It was a complex task. It was precisely in the period under review that the attempts on various sides to attack MarxismLeninism as the ideological-theoretical basis for the activity of the communist movement have been most acute. The Chinese leadership went over to the establishment in a number of countries of splinter groupings under the signboard of the so-called " MarxistLeninist parties", and has clearly tried to unite them in some way as a counterweight to the international communist movement. The Trotskyites have now and again formed blocs with these groupings. Here and there tendencies towards nationalistic self-isolation have been stepped up, and both ``Left'' and Right-wing opportunism have been revived.
The main aim has been to secure a turn towards the cohesion of the communist movement and consolidation of its ideological basis. An important stage in these efforts was the 1967 conference of European Communist Parties at Karlovy Vary and also a number of other international meetings of Communists.
As a result the question of calling an International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties was placed on the order of the day. It was preceded by much preparatory work. You are aware, comrades, that a considerable contribution to the elaboration of the idea of Ihe Meeting and to its preparation was made by our Party, by the CC CPSU.
The Meeting was a major step forward in strengthening the international unity of the Communists and in consolidating all the anti-imperialist forces. It has done a great deal for developing a number of propositions of Marxist-Leninist theory as applied to the present-day situation. It has been confirmed that this broadest and most representative form of intercourse between the fraternal Parties meets the needs of the communist movement as an international force. Our Party is in complete agreement with the conclu-
21sion drawn by the participants in the Meeting about the advisability of holding such international forums of fraternal Parties as the need arises. It would be useful for them to become an established practice of the world communist movement.
The celebrations of the Lenin Centenary, which became truly world-wide, were also of tremendous importance for the cohesion of the communist movement. The Meeting of Communist Parties and the Lenin Centenary once again showed the viability of the Marxist-Leninist teaching and brought about an upswing in the fraternal Parties' activity in the fight for the interests of the working class and all working people, and against imperialism, and its minions in the working-class movement.
On the whole there is ground to say that cohesion in the international communist movement is being increasingly strengthened, and that fruitful bilateral and multilateral inter-Party ties are becoming ever more active. Our Party welcomes this. It will work further to ensure continued development in precisely this direction. However, comrades, another fact we cannot afford to lose sight of is that negative phenomena have not yet been overcome everywhere. The fight against Right and ``Left''-wing revisionism, against nationalism, continues to be urgent. It is precisely the nationalistic tendencies, especially those which assume the form of antiSovietism, that bourgeois ideologists and bourgeois propaganda have placed most reliance on in their fight against socialism and the communist movement. They have been trying to induce the opportunist elements in the Communist Parties to make something of an ideological deal. They appear to be telling them: just give us proof that you are anti-Soviet, and we shall be prepared to proclaim that you are the true ``Marxists'', and that you are taking completely "independent attitudes". The course of events has shown, incidentally, that such men also take the way of struggle against the Communist Parties in their own countries. Examples of this are renegades of the types of Garaudy in France, Fischer in Austria, Petkov in Venezuela, and the ``Manifesto'' group leaders in Italy. The fraternal Parties regard the fight against such elements as an important condition for strengthening their ranks. Consequently, even these examples---and their number could easily be multiplied---testify that the struggle against revisionism and nationalism continues to be an important task of the Communist
Parties.
Comrades, in the struggle against imperialism an ever greater role is being played by the revolutionary-democratic parties, many of which have proclaimed socialism as their programme goal. The CPSU has been actively developing its ties with them. We arc sure that co-operation between such parties and the Communist Parties, including those in their own countries, fully meets the interests of the anti-imperialist movement, the strengthening of national independence and the cause of social progress.
22We maintain and have been developing relations with the Left Socialist parties in some countries of the West, East and Latin America. Fairly active work has been carried on on this plane in the last few years.
In accordance with the line laid down by the 1969 International Meeting, the CPSU is prepared to develop co-operation with the Social-Democrats both in the struggle for peace and democracy, and in the struggle for socialism, without, of course, making any concessions in ideology and revolutionary principles. However, this line of the Communists has been meeting with stubborn resistance from the Right-wing leaders of the Social-Democrats. Our Party has carried on and will continue to carry on an implacable struggle against any attitudes which tend to subordinate the working-class movement to the interests of monopoly capital, and to undermine the cause of the working people's struggle for peace, democracy and socialism.
Comrades, to the lot of the Communists have fallen the hardest trials of any that have ever fallen to the lot of fighters for the people's cause. We remember these words of Lenin's: "Selfless devotion to the revolution and revolutionary propaganda among the people are not wasted even if long decades divide the sowing from the harvest" (Collected Works, Vol. 18, p. 31). The ideas of the Communists have sprouted remarkable shoots in the practice of real socialism, and in the thoughts and deeds of millions upon millions of men.
The Communists of the Soviet Union put a high value on the tremendous work which is being done in their countries by the fraternal Communist and Workers' Parties. We are well aware how hard this work is, how much selfless dedication and boundless loyalty to our common great ideals it requires. Today we should like once again to assure our comrades-in-arms---the Communists of the whole world: our Party, dear friends, will ahvays march in closely serried, fighting ranks together with you!
We shall never forget the great sacrifices that have been made in the struggle. The names of the heroes of the communist movement, and the feats of courage and loyalty to the working-class cause will always remain sacred for all true revolutionaries. They will always remain sacred for Lenin's Party, for the Soviet people, which first raised the banner of victorious socialist revolution.
Conscious of its internationalist duty, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union will continue to pursue a line in international aifairs which helps further to invigorate the world-wide antiimperialist struggle, and to strengthen the fighting unity of all its participants.
The full triumph of the socialist cause all over the world is inevitable. And we shall not spare ourselves in the fight for this triumph, for the happiness of the working people!
233. THE SOVIET UNION'S STRUGGLE FOR PEACE AND THE SECURITY OP PEOPLES. REBUFF TO THE IMPERIALIST POLICY OF AGGRESSION
Comrades, in the period under review the Central Committee and the Soviet Government did their utmost to ensure peaceful conditions for communist construction in the USSR, to expose and frustrate action by the aggressive imperialist forces, and to defend socialism, and the freedom of peoples and peace.
Our policy has always combined firm rebuffs to aggression with the constructive line of settling pressing international problems and maintaining normal, and, wherever the situation allows, good, relations with states belonging to the other social system. As in the past, we have consistently stood up for the Leninist principle of peaceful coexistence of states, regardless of their social system. This principle has now become a real force of international development.
Let me deal with the most important international problems which because of their urgency or importance for the future have required our special attention.
To start with the events in South-East Asia. The aggressive war started by US ruling circles in that part of the world has not brought the American people any victorious laurels but tens of thousands of funeral wreaths. Anyone capable of taking a realistic view of things must realise that neither direct armed intervention, nor torpedoing of negotiations, nor even the ever wider use of mercenaries will break down the Vietnamese people's determination to become master of its o\vn country.
The so-called Vietnamisation of the war, that is, the plan to have Vietnamese kill Vietnamese in Washington's interests, anu the extention of the aggression to Cambodia and Laos---none of this will get the USA out of the bog of its dirty war in Indochina or wash away the shame heaped on that country by those who started and are continuing the aggression. There is only one way of solving the Vietnamese problem. It is clearly indicated in the proposals of the DRV Government and the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam, proposals which wre firmly back.
The Soviet Union resolutely demands an end to the imperialist aggression against the peoples of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Our country has been and will be an active champion of the just cause of the heroic peoples of Indochina.
The Middle East is another "hot spot" in world politics. The crisis which has arisen as a result of Israel's attack on the UAR, Syria and Jordan has been one of the most intense in the development of international relations over the past period.
Together with the fraternal socialist countries we did everything necessary to stop and condemn the aggression. We raised this question in the UN Security Council in the most resolute terms.
24An extraordinary session of the General Assembly was called on our demand. The USSR and other fraternal countries have broken off diplomatic relations with Israel, which has ignored the UN decision for a ceasefire. Our country has helped to restore the defence potential of the Arab states which were subjected to invasion, the UAR and Syria in the first place, with whom our co-- operation has been growing stronger from year to year.
The United Arab Republic recently came out with important initiatives. It announced its acceptance of the proposal put forward by the UN special representative, Dr. Gunnar Jarring, and readiness to conclude a peace agreement with Israel once the Israeli troops are withdrawn from the occupied Arab territories. The UAR has also proposed steps to resume navigation along the Suez Canal in the very near future. Thus, the attitude of the Arab side provides a real basis for settling the crisis in the Middle East. The Israeli Government's rejection of all these proposals, and Tel Aviv's now openly brazen claims to Arab lands clearly show who is blocking the way to peace in the Middle East, and who is to blame for the dangerous hotbed of war being maintained in that area. At the same time, the unseemly role of those who are instigating the Israeli extremists, the role of US imperialism and of international Zionism as an instrument of the aggressive imperialist circles, is becoming ever more obvious.
However, Tel Aviv ought to take a sober view of things. Do Israel's ruling circles really expect to secure for themselves the lands of others they have occupied and to go scot-free? In the final count, the advantages obtained by the invaders as a result of their piratical attack are illusory. They will disappear as mirages pass from view in the sands of Sinai. And the longer the delay in reaching a political settlement in the Middle East, the stronger will be the indignation of world public opinion, and the Arab people's hatred of the aggressor and its patrons, and the greater the harm the Israeli rulers will inflict on their people and their country.
The Soviet Union will continue its firm support of its Arab friends. Our country is prepared to join other powers, who are permanent members of the Security Council, in providing international guarantees for a political settlement in the Middle East.
Once this is reached, we feel that there could be a consideration of further steps designed for a military detente in the whole area, in particular, for converting the Mediterranean into a sea of peace and friendly co-operation.
Comrades, Europe has been one of the most important lines in our foreign policy activity all these years.
The improvement in Soviet-French relations has had important positive consequences for the whole course of European affairs. As a result of the recent talks in Moscow with the President of France and the signing of a Protocol on Political Consultations,
25the possibilities of Soviet-French co-operation have been extended. Our peoples' friendship rests on sound historical traditions. Today, our states also have an extensive sphere of common interests. We stand for the further development and deepening of relations between the USSR and France, and regard this as an important factor of international security.
New prospects in Europe are opening up as a result of a substantial shift in our relations with the FRG.
Throughout the whole postwar period, we, like our allies and friends, have proceeded from the fact that lasting peace in Europe rests above all on the inviolability of the borders of European states. Now, the treaties of the Soviet Union and Poland with the FRG have confirmed with full certainty the inviolability of borders, including those between the GDR and the FRG, and the western border of the Polish state.
There is a sharp demarcation of political forces in West Germany over the ratification of these treaties. One would assume that realistic-minded circles in Bonn, and also in some other Western capitals, are aware of this simple truth: delay over ratification would produce a fresh crisis of confidence over the whole of the FRG's policy, and would worsen the political climate in Europe and the prospects for easing international tensions.
As for the Soviet Union, it is prepared to meet the commitments it has assumed under the Soviet-West-Gcrman treaty. We are prepared to cover our part of the way towards normalisation and improvement of relations between the FRG and the socialist part of Europe, provided, of course, the other side acts in accordance with the letter and spirit of the treaty.
The positive changes that have recently taken place in Europe do not mean that the problems Europe inherited from the Second World War have been fully solved. What is to be done to continue the improvement in the European situation, to make headway in ensuring collective security in Europe, and in developing co-operation both on a bilateral and on an all-European basis?
The situation in Europe as a whole would be improved by the convocation of an all-European conference. The holding of such a conference is now backed by a majority of the European states. Preparations for it are being carried into the plane of practical politics. But attempts to prevent a detente in Europe have not ceased. All the states of this continent will still have to make serious efforts to bring about the convocation of an all-European conference.
An improvement of the situation on the continent naturally requires that the Soviet-West-German and the Polish-West-- German treaties should enter into force as soon as possible.
There should also be a settlement of the problems connected with West Berlin. If the USA, France and Britain proceed, as we have done, from respect for the allied agreements which deter-
26mine the special status of West Berlin, from respect for the sovereign rights of the GDR as an independent socialist state, the current negotiations could be successful!}- completed to the advantage of all ilie parties concerned, inculcliiig the West Berlin population itself.
Another pressing task is establishment of equitable relations between the GDR and the FRG, based on the generally accepted rules of international law, and also admission of both these states to the United Nations.
Considerable importance should also be attached to the satisfaction of the legitimate demand of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic that the Munich Agreement should be recognised as having been invalid from the outset.
Comrades, disarmament is one of the most important international problems of our day. We seek to secure concrete results reducing the danger of war, and to prevent the peoples from accepting the arms race as an inevitable evil.
A treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons was prepared and has entered into force in the period under review. Although far from all states, including some of the nuclear powers, have yet acceded to it, it does to a certain extent reduce the danger of an outbreak of nuclear war. The important point now is to have the FRG, Japan, Italy and other countries back up their signatures to the treaty with its ratification.
Treaties banning the stationing of nuclear weapons in outer space and on the sea- and ocean-floor have been concluded. But what has been achieved constitutes only the first few steps. It is our aim to bring about a situation in which nuclear energy shall serve peaceful purposes only.
We are engaged in negotiations with the USA on a limitation of strategic armaments. Their favourable outcome would make it possible to avoid another round in the missile arms race, and to release considerable resources for constructive purposes. We are seeking to have the negotiations produce positive results.
However, I should like to emphasize that disarmament talks in general, to say nothing of those involving discussion of highly delicate military-technical aspects, can be productive only if equal consideration is given to the security interests of the parties, and if no one seeks to obtain unilateral advantages.
The struggle for an end to the arms race, both in nuclear and conventional weapons, and for disarmament---all the way to general and complete disarmament---will continue to be one of the most important lines in the foreign-policy activity of the CPSU and the Soviet state.
In recent years, the USSR's relations with the countries of the capitalist world have been fairly active and diverse. With some of them co-operation has been extended on general foreign-policy issues, and political consultations promoting better mutual under-
27standing have been accepted in practice. Economic, scientific and technical ties, in some instances resting on a long-term basis, have acquired considerable scale. For instance, we have been co-- operating---on mutually advantageous terms, of course---with Italy in building the Volzhsky Auto Works, and with Austria and several other countries in developing the gas industry, including the laying of gas pipelines from the Soviet Union to Western Europe. Agreement was recently reached on the Soviet Union's participation in setting up an iron-and-steel complex in France. Japanese companies are to co-operate in building a new port in the Far East. Other major projects, in which our business partners have displayed a keen interest, are at the discussion stage.
As usual, we have devoted much attention to our relations with our neighbours. Good neighbourly relations and co-operation with Finland have continued to grow stronger; our relations with Afghanistan and Iran have been developing successfully; we have normal relations with Pakistan and Turkey; our ties with Sweden are stable.
Our friendly relations with India have developed considerably. The Indian Government's pursuit of a peaceable, independent line in international affairs, and the traditional feelings of friendship linking the peoples of the two countries have all helped to strengthen Soviet-Indian co-operation.
We believe there are considerable possibilities for further extending mutually advantageous co-operation with Japan, although the attempts by some Japanese circles to exploit the so-called territorial question have naturally done nothing to benefit Soviet-- Japanese relations. Their complete normalisation on an appropriate contractual basis is also being hampered by the existence of foreign military bases in Japan. The fact is that such normalisation would be in line with the long-term interests of the peoples of the two countries, and the interests of peace in the Far East and in the Pacific area.
Now about the Soviet Union's relations with the United States of America. An improvement in Soviet-American relations would be in the interests of the Soviet and the American peoples, the interests of stronger peace. However, we cannot pass over the US aggressive actions in various parts of the world. In the recent period, the US Administration has taken a more rigid stance on a number of international issues, including some which have a bearing on the interests of the Soviet Union. The frequent zigzags in US foreign policy, which are apparently connected with some kind of domestic political moves dictated by short-term considerations, have also made dealings with the United States much more difficult.
We proceed from the assumption that it is possible to improve relations between the USSR and the USA. Our principled line with respect to the capitalist countries, including the USA, is consistent-
28ly and fully to practise the principles of peaceful coexistence, to develop mutually advantageous ties, and to co-operate, with states prepared to do so, in strengthening peace, making our relations with them as stable as possible. But we have to consider whether we are dealing with a real desire to settle outstanding issues at the negotiation table or attempts to conduct a "positions of strength" policy.
Whenever the imperialists need to cover up their aggressive schemes, they try to revive the "Soviet menace" myth. They seek to find evidence of this threat in the depths of the Indian Ocean and on the peaks of the Cordilleras. And, of course, nothing but Soviet divisions prepared for a leap against the West are to be discovered on the plains of Europe if these arc viewed through NATO field-glasses.
But the peoples will not be deceived by the attempts to ascribe to (he Soviet Union intentions which are alien to it. We declare with a full sense of responsibility: we have no territorial claims on anyone whatsoever, we threaten no one, and have no intention of attacking anyone, we stand for the free and independent development of all nations. But let no one, for his part, try to talk to us in terms of ultimatums and strength.
We have everything necessary---a genuine peace policy, military might and the unity of Soviet people---to ensure the inviolability of our borders against any encroachments, and to defend the gains of socialism.
Comrades, the period under review marked the end of the quarter-century since the rout of Hitler Germany and militarist Japan. The fruits of that great victory still live in international realities today. The Soviet people cherish everything that has been attained at such great cost.
For more than 25 years now, our people have lived in peace. We regard this as the greatest achievement of our Party's foreign policy. For a quarter-century now, mankind has been safeguarded from world war. That is another historic achievement of the peoples, to which the Soviet Union and its foreign policy have made a considerable contribution. However, the forces of aggression and militarism may have been pushed back, but they have not been rendered harmless. In the post-war years, they have started more than 30 wars and armed conflicts of varying scale. Nor is it possible to consider the threat of another world wTar as having been completely eliminated. It is the vital task of all the peaceable sates, of all the peoples, to prevent this threat from becoming reality.
The Soviet Union has countered the aggressive policy of imperialism with its policy of active defence of peace and strengthening of international security. The main lines of this policy are well known. Our Party, our Soviet state, in co-operation with the fraternal socialist countries and other peace-loving states, and with
29the wholehearted support of many millions of people throughout the world, have now for many years been waging a struggle on these lines, taking a stand for the cause of peace and friendship among nations. The CPSU regards the following as the basic concrete tasks of this struggle in the present situation.
First.
To eliminate the hotbeds of war in South-East Asia and in the Middle East and to promote a political settlement in these areas on the basis of respect for the legitimate rights of states and peoples subjected to aggression.
To give an immediate and firm rebuff to any acts of aggression and international arbitrariness. For this, full use must also be made of the possibilities of the United Nations.
Repudiation of the threat or use of force in settling outstanding issues must become a law of international life. For its part, the Soviet Union invites the countries which accept this approach to conclude appropriate bilateral or regional treaties.
Second.
To proceed from the final recognition of the territorial changes that took place in Europe as a result of the Second World War. To bring about a radical turn towards detente and peace on this continent. To ensure the convocation and success of an all-European conference.
To do everything to ensure collective security in Europe. We reaffirm the readiness expressed jointly by the participants in the defensive Warsaw Treaty -to have a simultaneous annulment of this treaty and of the North Atlantic alliance, or---as a first step---• dismantling of their military organisations.
Third.
To conclude treaties putting a ban on nuclear, chemical, and bacteriological weapons.
To work for an end to the testing of nuclear weapons, including underground tests, by everyone everywhere.
To promote the establishment of nuclear-free zones in various parts of the world.
We stand for the nuclear disarmament of all states in possession of nuclear weapons, and for the convocation for these purposes of a conference of the five nuclear powers---the USSR, the USA, the PRC, France and Britain.
Fourth.
To invigorate the struggle to halt the race in all types of weapons. We favour the convocation of a world conference to consider disarmament questions to their full extent.
30We stand for the dismantling of foreign military bases. We stand for a reduction of armed forces and armaments in areas \vhcre the military confrontation is especially dangerous, above all in Central Europe.
We consider it advisable to work out measures reducing the probability of accidental outbreak or deliberate fabrication of armed incidents and their development into international crises, into war.
The Soviet Union is prepared to negotiate agreements on reducing military expenditure, above all by the major powers.
Fifth.
The UN decisions on the abolition of the remaining colonial regimes must be fully carried out. Manifestations of racism and apartheid must be universally condemned and boycotted.
Sixth.
The Soviet Union is prepared to expand relations of mutually advantageous co-operation in every sphere with states which for their part seek to do so. Our country is prepared to participate together with the other states concerned in settling problems like the conservation of the environment, development of power and other natural resources, development of transport and communications, prevention and eradication of the most dangerous and widespread diseases, and the exploration and development of outer space and the world ocean.
Such are the main features of the programme for the struggle for peace and international co-operation, for the freedom and independence of nations, which our Party has put forward.
And we declare that, while consistently pursuing its policy of peace and friendship among nations, the Soviet Union will continue to conduct a resolute struggle against imperialism, and firmly to rebuff the evil designs and subversions of aggressors. As in the past, we shall give undeviating support to the people's struggle for democracy, national liberation and socialism.
Comrades, it is clear from what has been said that the past five years have been a period of vigorous and intense activity by our Party and state in the sphere of international policy.
Of course, in international affairs not everything depends on us or our friends alone. We have not advanced in every sphere as fast as we should like towards the goals we set ourselves. A number of important acts have yet to be brought to completion, and their importance will become fully evident later. But the overall balance is obvious: great results have been achieved in these five years. Our country's international position has become even stronger, its prestige has been enhanced, and the Soviet people's peaceful endeavour has reliable protection.
31II.
The Main Questions of the Party's Economic Policy at the Present Stage
Comrades, fifty years ago, when putting up for broad discussion the GOELRO plan, history's first state plan for economic development, V. I. Lenin said that when the Party and the Soviet Government came to concentrate on the country's economic development, that period would be the happiest epoch. He urged that congresses and conferences should be turned into "bodies that will verify our economic achievements, bodies in which we can really learn the business of economic development" (Collected Works, Vol. 31, p. 514).
Our Party congresses have in fact become such bodies in the full sense of the word! As Lenin had predicted, economics is the main policy for the Party and the Soviet state, a policy on whose success decisively depends the advance of Soviet society towards communism and the consolidation of the international positions of our socialist power.
In reporting on the work done in this most important direction, the Party's Central Committee has good ground to say that the Soviet people have brought the Eighth Five-Year Plan to a fitting completion, thereby taking another major step forward in building the material and technical basis of communism, in strengthening the country's might, and in raising the people's living standards.
On the whole, the eighth five-year period has yielded considerably greater results than the preceding one.
Key Indicators of National Economic Development in the Seventh and the Eighth Five-Year Periods
(comparable prices; increment in thousand million rubles and growth
in per cent)
Seventh five-year period (1961-1965)
Eighth five-year period (1966-1970)
Aggregate social product National income used for consumption and accumulation Industrial production
of which
Group A
Group B
Agricultural production (annual average output as compared with preceding period)
Capital investment (for the five years)
Freight turnover for all types of transport (thousand million tonkm) Retail trade
Absolute -5 increment
113 45 84 1965%% of
1960 137132 151
Absolute -5 increment
17577 125
1970)(.% of 1965
142141 150
66 18
158 136
91 34
151 149
7.1 77
112 145
14.0 104
121 142
878 26.1
147 134
1,061 50.2
138 148
1. THE MAIN RESULTS OF THE EIGHTH FIVE-YEAR PLAN PERIOD AND THE TASKS OF THE PARTY'S ECONOMIC POLICY
The country's national income which went into consumption and accumulation increased at an average rate of 7.1 per cent a year, as against 5.7 per cent in the preceding period. Productivity of social labour---a key indicator of efficiency in production---has increased by 37 per cent, as against 29 per cent in the seventh five-year period.
Heavy industry, the basis of the economy, has been further developed. The branches which determine technical progress---- electric power, the chemical and the petrochemical industries, engineering, especially radio electronics and instrument-making---have been developing at a much faster rate. The share of the products turned out by these branches has increased from 28 to 33 per cent of total industrial output. The light and the food industries have been developing rapidly. The output of consumer goods in the five years has gone up by 49 per cent. To illustrate the present scale of production, one need merely say that industrial output in 1970 alone was approximately double the industrial output for all the prewar five-year periods taken together.
2---3233
33
NATIONAL ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT IN 1966-1970
In the economic sphere the main result of the five-year period is that the scale of the national economy has been substantially increased, its development accelerated, and qualitative indicators improved.
The Directives of the 23rd Congress have been successfully fulfilled in the main economic targets. The national income was to have increased by 38-41 per cent; it has in fact grown by 41 per cent. Industrial production, with a target of 47-50 per cent, has increased by 50 per cent. The targets set by the Directives lor the key indicators relating to the raising of the working people's living standard have been overfulfilled.
32The following table gives an idea of the growth of industrial output in 1966-1970.
The following table gives an idea of the annual average out
put of major farm products:
million tons
1966-1970
1961-1965
1966-1970
%% of
1961-1965
Grain
130.3
167.5
129Raw cotton
5.0
6.1
122Sugar-beet (for factory processing)
59.2
81.0
137Sunflower seeds
5.1
6.4
126Flax fibre
0.41
0.46
112Potatoes
81.6
94.8
116Vegetables
16.9
19.3
114Meat (slaughter weight)
9.3
11.6
124Milk
64.7
80.5
124Eggs (thousand million)
28.7
35.8
124Wool (thousand tons)
362 397 110Electric power (thousand million kwh)
Oil, including gas condensate ( million tons)
Coal (million tons) Gas (thousand million m^^3^^) Steel (million tons) Holled steel (million tons)
Output of engineering and metalv.-orking industries (thousand million rubles)
Mineral fertilisers, in reference units (million tons)
Synthetic resins and plastics ( thousand tons)
Cement (million tons)
Fabrics, all types (thousand million
m^^2^^)
Garments (thousand million rubles)
Leather footwear (million pairs)
Radio and television sets (million units)
Domestic refrigerators (million units)
1965 1970 1970%% of
1965 146 145108 154 127 130
174 177
208 132
118177 139
164 247
507243 578 129
91 7151 31
803 727.5
9.0 486
740353 624 200 116 92
551,072 95
8.9
15.9 676
14.5 4.1
The 1970 results need to be dealt with separately. More than 186 million tons of grain and 6.9 million tons of raw cotton were received in the country. We have never yet had such high gross output. Grain averaged 15.6 centners, and cotton 25 centners per hectare.
The five-year period target for freight turnover was fulfilled. Capital construction proceeded on a large scale. Almost 1,900 large industrial enterprises and installations have been commissioned. A good reserve has been created for a further build-up of production capacities in the early years of the current five-year period.
The location of the country's productive forces has been improved. The economic potential of Siberia, the Far East, Central Asia and Kazakhstan has markedly increased. The national economy of all the republics has made a stride forward, and the contribution of each to the fulfilment of ail-Union tasks has grown. This means that the economic foundation of the union and brotherhood of all our peoples has been enlarged.
The past five-year period has been an important one in the fulfilment of social tasks. The changes that have taken place in social relations will be dealt with below. At this point I should like to dwell on some questions connected with the people's rising living standards. In the five years, real incomes per head of population have increased by 33 per cent, as compared with the 30 per cent provided for by the Directives of the Party's 23rd Congress, and the 19 per cent in the preceding five-year period.
You are aware, comrades, that in this five-year period, the minimum wage for workers and office employees was raised to 60 rubles a month. The average wage of workers and office employees for the country has increased by 26 per cent. Collective farmers' incomes from social production have increased by 42 per cent. Guaranteed remuneration for labour has been introduced,
2* 35
1.7
In the past five-year period, considerable successes have been achieved in agricultural development. For a number of reasons, this branch has been and for the time being remains the most difficult and complex sector of our economy. That is why it is a source of satisfaction that the Party's work, the efforts of our working people in the countryside and workers in the industries concerned have been crowned with major achievements.
Annual average farm output has increased by 21 per cent, as compared with 12 per cent in the preceding five-year period. The most substantial shifts have taken place in the production of grain, whose annual average gross output has increased by 37 million tons, or 30 per cent. The production of meat, milk, eggs and other produce has been markedly increased.
34the pension age has been lowered, and the payment of sick benefits and disability allowances has been introduced for members of collective farms.
In the five years, social consumption funds have increased by 50 per cent, to almost 64 thousand million rubles in 1970.
The growth of retail trade is a key indicator of the level of living standards. In 1966-1970, it came to 48 per cent, with the structure of consumption being considerably improved. Compared with 1965, consumption of meat per person increased in 1970 by 17 per cent, milk and milk products by 22 per cent, eggs by 23 per cent, fish and fish products by 33 per cent, and sugar by 14 per cent, with a simultaneous reduction in the consumption of bread and potatoes. The sale to the population of cultural and household articles, especially of consumer durables---radios, television sets, washing machines, refrigerators, and so on---has increased.
Everybody knows on what scale we have tackled and how perseveringly we are working on the housing problem. The state has spent nearly 60 thousand million rubles under this head. More than 500 million sq m of housing have been put up in the past five years. This means that the equivalent of more than 50 large cities with one million population each was built in the country. Most of the family house-warmings were celebrated in separate apartments with modern amenities.
The systems of public education and health have made good headway. The Soviet people's health and longevity are an object of the Party's and the state's constant concern. In 1966-70 we trained 151,000 doctors, or 22,000 more than in the preceding five years. The network of medical institutions was expanded considerably.
For some years, most Soviet workers and office employees have had a five-day \vork week with two days off. Paid annual leaves have been lengthened for a considerable part of the working people.
As you see, the people's standard of living has risen quite substantially in the past five years. Permit us to express the trust that these achievements will be a source of fresh inspiration for Soviet people, arousing their desire to work still more effectively for the country's good, for the good of our heroic people!
Summing up the results of the past five years and giving their due to the successes achieved, the Party is aware of the shortcomings in the economic field, of the unresolved problems. It should be noted, first of all, that production targets for some important items were not fully met.
There were also delays in expanding production capacity in the chemical industry, machine-tools, the light and a few other industries. Many ministries have not fulfilled the plans for introducing new equipment and have fallen short of the labour pro-
36ductivity targets. The plans for supplying agriculture with electricity and machinery have not been fully met.
While the average wage increase targets were surpassed, the rates and basic wages of some categories have not been increased as envisaged in the plan. Though considerable, accretion in the production of some food products, especially meat, and of consumer goods, is still below the demand, sometimes creating shortages in the shops.
These difficulties are partly traceable to objective causes of an external and internal order. But, naturally, at this Congress we should focus our attention especially on the causes relating to deficiencies in the work of the economic, government and Party bodies, to shortcomings in planning, in producing and mastering new equipment, and in making use of available reserves.
However, the shortcomings and unresolved problems do not obscure the main point---the basic positive results of our five-year plan. The Party and people have coped well with a big and complicated task, that of combining continued economic development and reinforcement of the country's defences with a considerably greater rise in the living standard of the working people.
The successes of the Soviet people in economic development are of great political significance. They have led to a further consolidation of the socialist system in our country, to still closer cohesion of the entire Soviet people round the Party. They have contributed greatly to the common cause of augmenting the economic strength of the socialist states and strengthening the positions of the world socialist system in the economic competition with capitalism.
Comrades, defining the trend in the country's economic development, the 23rd Congress not only approved the main indicators for the Eighth Five-Year Plan, but also raised a number of important questions of long-term economic policy. Resolving these, the Central Committee, acting on the instructions of the Congress, also took steps to remedy the shortcomings of the preceding period in the management of agriculture and industry.
We can report to the Congress that much has been done in the past five years to improve economic management. The Central Committee plenary meetings, CC decisions and those of the Council of Ministers of the USSR resolved major economic problems. Special mention should be made of the importance of the May (1966) and July (1970) Plenary Meetings, which worked out a comprehensive long-term development programme for agriculture, and of the December (1969) Plenary Meeting, which discussed fundamental questions of the development of our economy, such as the ways to enhance the effectiveness of production and improve management. Summing up the results of all this work, it may be said that the Party has made tangible progress in the
37period under review in studying and conceptualising a number of the biggest and most complicated questions of its economic policy.
The Central Committee considers it necessary to note the increase in the creative activity of local Party organisations and committees. The Party organisations of many republics, territories and regions made important economic suggestions of nation-wide significance to the Central Committee. These were studied and taken into account when framing national economic decisions.
It is an important result of the Party's work in the period under review that Party, government, economic and trade-union cadres and the masses of working people have begun to look more deeply into economic matters, that they show a better understanding of our problems and the ways of solving them.
The country's economic achievements are the result of selfless work in industry, agriculture, transport and building, science and culture, of the work of all the peoples of our multinational country. On behalf of the Congress, permit me to congratulate the working class, the collective farmers, the intelligentsia, all the working people of the Soviet Union, on their great victories in labour!
While discussing at this Congress the fundamental aspects of the Party's economic policy for the coming period, we should pay attention to some of the specific features of the present stage in our economic development.
The most important of these is the economy's entirely new magnitude. Immense economic strength has been built up, based on a versatile industry and large-scale socialist agriculture, advanced science and skilled cadres of workers, specialists and managers, an economy that daily produces a social product worth nearly 2 thousand million rubles, that is, ten times more than at the end of the thirties.
The Party takes this enormous growth of the country's economic power into account in its economic activity. What does this mean in concrete terms? First and foremost, it means a considerable growth of our possibilities. These days we set ourselves and perform tasks of which we could only dream in the preceding stages.
At the same time, in the present conditions the demands which society puts on the economy are rapidly increasing along with the economic possibilities. In the early stages of building socialism, it will be recalled, we were compelled to concentrate on the top priorities, on which the very existence of the young Soviet state depended. Now the situation is changing. Not only do we wish to--- for we have always wished it---but we can and must deal simultaneously with a broader set of problems.
While securing resources for continued economic growth, while technically re-equipping production, and investing enormously in science and education, we must at the same time concentrate more and more energy and means on tasks relating to the improvement of the Soviet people's wellbeing. While breaking through in one sector or another, be it ever so important, we can no longer afford any drawn-out lag in any of the others.
The high degree of economic development achieved by our country has yet another important effect: the demands on planning, guidance and economic management techniques are rising substantially. The interdependence of all the economic links is enhancing, adding to the importance of long-term planning, of forging a system of inter-industry connections, and of improving material supplies.
Important specific features of the present stage of the country's economic development are also traceable to the rapidly unfolding scientific and technical revolution. Socialism, the planned socialist economy offer the broadest scope for the all-sided progress of science and technology. However, the scientific and technical revolution requires the improvement of many sides of our economic activity. In other words, it is a huge force favourable for socialism, but one that has to be properly mastered.
39THE SPECIFICS OF THE PRESENT STAGE IN THE COUNTRY'S ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND THE TASKS OF THE NEW FIVE-YEAR
PLAN
Comrades, V. I. Lenin stressed that the difficulty and art of politics consist in taking into account the specifics of the tasks of each period, the specifics of the conditions in which the Party operates. This approach is also immensely important in working out economic policy, which must take into account the main features of each stage in the country's development.
In our country, it will be recalled, socialism triumphed back in the latter half of the thirties. This was followed by more than three decades of the Soviet people's heroic labour and struggle. Our economy of that time and our present-day economy are based on the same type of relations of production, on the same economic laws, the laws of socialism. However, there are important ! new features that distinguish the modern economy from the eco- , nomy of the late thirties.
An immeasurably higher level has been achieved in the national economy, in socialist social relations, the culture and the consciousness of the broad masses. The developed socialist society which Lenin referred to in 1918 as the future of our country has been built by the selfless labour of the Soviet people. This has enabled us to tackle in practice the great task set by the Party Programme, by its latest congresses---that of building the mate- | rial and technical basis of communism.
38Some of the specific features of the present historical stage are also shaped by serious changes in the external conditions. The most important of these, as we have noted, is the unfolding process of the economic integration of the socialist countries, and in accomplishing many of our economic tasks we must take that process into account. We must also take into account the considerably greater role these days of such an area of the class struggle between socialism and capitalism as the economic and technico-scientific competition of the two world systems.
Those are some of the important features of the present stage in the country's economic development. Translated into political tasks, we could describe them briefly as follows: the vast scale of the national economy, the greater economic possibilities and social requirements pose the imperative of greatly improving the standard of all our economic work, substantially raising the effectiveness of our economy, turning our entire vast economy into a still better working, well-geared mechanism.
In all things, we were always helped by our revolutionary will and breadth of vision, by the Party's skill in mobilising the energy of the millions for the fulfilment of constructive tasks, by the labour enthusiasm of the working class, the collective farmers and the intelligentsia. It is more than ever necessary now to combine this great force still more closely with systematic and painstaking organisational work, with a consistently scientific approach to economic management, with rigorous self-discipline and all-round efficiency.
Comrades, the above circumstances were taken into account by the Central Committee in drafting so important a political document as the Directives for the new five-year plan.
The Ninth Five-Year Plan is sure to be an important stage in Soviet society's further advance to communism, in building its material and technical basis, in augmenting the country's economic and defensive might. The main task of the Five-Year Plan is to secure a considerable rise in the living standard and cultural level of the people on the basis of high rates of growth of socialist production, increase in its effectiveness, scientific and technical progress and accelerated growth of the productivity of labour.
In the coming five years the national income is to be increased 37-40 per cent, with the consumption fund going up 40 and the accumulation fund 37 per cent. Industrial output will rise 42-46 per cent and the average annual agricultural output 20-22 per cent, while real per capita incomes will go up by nearly one-third.
Inasmuch as Comrade A. N. Kosygin will deliver the report on the Directives for the Five-Year Economic Development Plan of the USSR for 1971-1975, permit me to dwell on just the three basic questions of the Party's economic policy in the period ahead.
To begin with, the question of the main aims on which the Party is orienting the development of Soviet economy.
Further, the question of the sources of growth, the resources that must be mobilised for the further rapid rise of social production.
Lastly, the question of improving the mechanism of economic management in order to secure successful economic growth.
2. RAISING THE STANDARD OF LIVING IS THE SUPREME AIM OF THE PARTY'S ECONOMIC POLICY
Setting a substantial rise of the standard of living of the working people as the main task of the Ninth Five-Year Plan, the Central Committee believes that this will determine not only our activity for the coming five years, but also the long-term general orientation of the country's economic development. In setting this course the Party proceeds primarily from the postulate that under socialism the fullest possible satisfaction of the people's material and cultural requirements is the supreme aim of social production.
From the first days of Soviet power our Party and state have been doing their utmost in this respect. But for well-known historical reasons our possibilities were limited for a long time. Now they are substantially greater, which enables the Party to raise the question of centering economic development still more fully on improving the life of the people.
The Party also proceeds from the fact that a higher standard of living is becoming an ever more imperative requirement of our economic development, one of the important economic preconditions for the rapid growth of production.
This approach follows not only from our policy of further accentuating the role of material and moral labour incentives. The question is posed much more broadly: to create conditions favourable for the all-round development of the abilities and creative activity of Soviet people, of all working people, that is, to develop the main productive force of society.
Modern production sets rapidly rising demands not only on machines, on technology, but also and primarily on the workers, on those who create these machines and control this technology. For ever larger segments of workers specialised knowledge and a high degree of professional training, man's general cultural standard, are becoming an obligatory condition of successful work. And all these depend to a considerable extent on the standard of living, on how fully the material and spiritual requirements can be satisfied.
Thus, our aims, the greater economic potential and the requirements of economic development make it possible and necessary to steer the economy more fully to resolving the highly diverse tasks relating to the improvement of the people's standard of liv-
40 41ing. The Eighth Five-Year Plan has yielded considerable practical results in this respect. Now it is up to us not only to consolidate the achievements, but also to attain new substantial advances.
Defining improvement of the living standard of the working people as the main task, we should refrain, of course, from approaching the matter in a simplified way. It will take time, serious effort, immense means and resources to implement the course of considerably raising the people's standard of living. One can distribute, one can consume only what one has produced. This is a self-evident truth. Our plans derive their strength and realism from the fact that they closely connect the improvement of the living standard with greater social production, with a higher productivity of labour. But this also predicates the responsibility that devolves on the Party, on the Soviet people as a whole. How well we are living today and how well we shall live to-morrow depends on ourselves, on our success in labour.
Allow me to report on the proposals and plans relating to the people's well-being, which the Party's Central Committee and the USSR Council of Ministers are submitting to the Congress.
A further increase is envisaged of the working people's cash incomes. Three-quarters of the accretion in the real incomes of the population is to be accounted for by higher payment for work.
During these five years the minimum monthly wage for workers and office employees will be raised to 70 rubles. The basic wages and salaries of the middle brackets in industry, transport and in other fields of material production shall be raised. The rates for operators of farm machinery shall be increased. Higher salaries are also envisaged for schoolteachers, doctors and other medical personnel and people in a number of other professions. In many branches, additions to wages are to be introduced or increased in the Urals, the European North, Western Siberia, Kazakhstan (excepting the southern part of the Republic) and a number of regions in the Far East, Eastern Siberia and Central Asia. Payment for night work is to go up considerably.
These measures will be carried out gradually, by areas and economic branches. All in all, they will affect some 90 million workers and office employees. As a result, in the coming five years the average monthly wage of workers and office employees will rise to 146-149 rubles and the remuneration of collective farmers' labour to 98 rubles
It is also envisaged to extend the tax privileges for some categories of working people.
I should also like to touch on yet another question, comrades.
The only way we could advance and develop the economy during the years of industrialisation and postwar reconstruction was by mobilising all our strength and resources. The people of our country understood this well. To the common cause they contributed not only their selfless labour, but also their savings, sub-
42x ij scribing actively to government loans, which played an important
part in accelerating economic development. The mass subscriptions were not only a tangible contribution to the state budget, but also an impressive demonstration of the Soviet people's patriotism, their devotion to the cause of socialism.
It will be recalled that we were able to stop issuing new government loans as from 1958. However, a moratorium was declared on payment of the bonds still held by the population, of which there are about 25,800 million rubles' worth, for a 20 year period, making them payable from 1977 to 1996 in equal yearly sums.
Having examined our present resources, the Central Committee of the CPSU and the USSR Council of Ministers consider it possible to begin redeeming the bonds before the fixed term and to cover 2 thousand million rubles' worth in 1974-1975, increasing the amounts payable in the subsequent years. It is planned to redeem all bonds held by the population by 1990, that is, six years ahead of the originally fixed term. As we see it, this decision is correct and corresponds completely to the Party's policy and the interests of the people.
Apart from the increase of incomes in payment for work, the social consumption funds are to be raised considerably. It is planned to increase them by 40 per cent, so that in 1975 they will amount to 90 thousand million rubles. These sums will be used for the further improvement of medical services, and the development of education and the upbringing of the rising generation.
The social funds will also be used to finance a number of other important social measures, including improvement of the living conditions of large families and needy families, women work* ing in production, pensioners, and students.
It is planned:
---to introduce cash allowances for children where the income per family member does not exceed 50 rubles;
---to increase the number of paid days allowed for caring for a sick child and to introduce 100-per cent paid pregnancy and maternity leaves for all working women, regardless of length of employment;
---to raise the minimum old-age pensions for workers and office employees;
---to raise the minimum pensions of collective farmers and to apply to them the procedure of calculating the size of pension established for workers and office employees;
---to improve pension provisions for invalids and families that have lost their breadwinner in the case of workers and office employees and servicemen;
---to increase scholarships and extend scholarship eligibility in higher and specialised secondary educational establishments;
---to increase the allowance for meals in hospitals and urban vocational technical schools.
To carry out the new measures relating to wages and salaries and greater allowances out of the social consumption funds, aimed at raising the standard of living, 22 thousand million rubles are allocated in the current five-year plan as against 10 thousand million in the Eighth Five-Year Plan.
House-building will continue on a still larger scale. In the next five years we are planning to build housing totalling 565-575 million sq m, which will enable us to improve the living conditions of approximately 60 million people. Considerable funds are also being allocated for public utilities and for town and village improvement.
In this connection, I should like to refer specially to Moscow. It is cherished by all Soviet people as the capital of our country, our biggest industrial, cultural and scientific centre, as the symbol of our great socialist state. Large-scale work in the field of housing development, town improvement and the improvement of transport facilities will continue in Moscow as before. To make Moscow a model communist city is the bounden duty of the entire Soviet people.
Attention should be redoubled with regard to the improvement of the country's other cities as well. The advantages of socialism enable us to direct the natural process of urban growth in such a way as to provide increasingly healthier and more comfortable living conditions for the urban population.
Comrades, while mapping out measures to increase substantially the incomes of Soviet people, to extend house-building and to improve towns and villages, the Central Committee holds that special significance now also attaches to the task of satisfying the growing solvent demand of the population for foodstuffs, manufactured goods and services. Consumer goods production must go up at a higher rate than the cash incomes of Soviet people.
This problem will be resolved by stepping up the growth of all branches of the economy manufacturing these goods. From this standpoint, too, the Party approaches the important problem of correlating the main proportions in industry.
The Central Committee holds that the accumulated productive potential permits somewhat higher rates of growth for group B in the new five-year period, which will make it possible to achieve the envisaged rise of the living standard. It stands to reason that this does not invalidate our general policy oriented on the accelerated development of the production of means of production. In determining the correlation of the rates of growth of the two subdivisions, the Party, just as Lenin taught, proceeds from the concrete requirements and existing resources of each stage.
44HEAVY INDUSTRY IS THE FOUNDATION OF THE COUNTRY'S ECONOMIC POWER AND THE FURTHER RISE OF THE PEOPLE'S LIVING STANDARD
The above-mentioned modification of the national-economic proportions does not mean that we are slackening our concern for heavy industry.
The Party's policy of ensuring the priority development of socialist industry, and principally its basis, heavy industry, has turned our country into a mighty power. It will be no exaggeration to say that only the consistent effectuation of this policy has enabled us to safeguard the gains of the socialist revolution, to end the centuries-long backwardness, to Achieve gigantic economic, social and cultural progress.
High growth rates in heavy industry fully retain their importance in the present conditions.
They retain their importance principally because extended socialist reproduction, the possibilities and rates of future economic growth and the building of the material and technical basis of communism are all largely dependent on the successful development of heavy industry. Dependent on its work is the technical equipment of all spheres of the economy, the supply of material and technical resources for higher labour productivity.
They also retain their importance because without developing heavy industry we cannot maintain our defence capability at the level necessary to guarantee the country's security and the peaceful labour of our people. Much has been done in this respect in the past five years: the Soviet Army is now equipped with all types of modern weaponry. The further development of the defence industry, its concrete work programmes, depend in many ways on the international situation. The Soviet Union is prepared to support realistic disarmament measures that consolidate peace and do not impair our security. At the same time we must be prepared for any possible turns in the train of events.
Lastly, the development of heavy industry is of special significance because, among other things, the basic tasks of improving the standard of living cannot be achieved without it. Heavy industry is to increase considerably the output of the means of production for the accelerated development of agriculture and the light and the food industries, for more housing, for the further promotion of trade and community services.
That, precisely, is the ultimate purpose of heavy industry. In this connection, allow me to recall the words of V. I. Lenin: "In the final analysis the manufacture of means of production is necessarily bound up with that of articles of consumption, since the former are not manufactured for their own sake, but only because more and more means of production are demanded by the branches of industry manufacturing articles of consumption" (Collected Works, Vol. 4, p. 163).
45The Party is setting heavy industry yet another important task ---to expand the manufacture of consumer goods directly in its own enterprises. For this all its branches possess considerable facilities. I should also like to mention the defence industry in the same context. Today, as much as 42 per cent of its output is used for civilian purposes. By virtue of its high scientific and technical level, its expertise, inventions and discoveries are of cardinal importance for all spheres of the economy.
Consequently, far from diminishing, the role of heavy industry is continuing to gain in importance in the present stage, because the immediate practical problems with which it deals are growing. In the coming five years its leading branches face very ambitious assignments: to raise the output of electricity to over 1,000,000 million kilowatt/hours, oil to 480-500 million tons, gas to 300-320 thousand million cubic metres and steel to 142-150 million tons. The output of the engineering, metal-working, chemical and petrochemical industries is to go up 70 per cent.
The Party is confident that the \vorkers of heavy industry will cope creditably with these important and noble tasks.
THE PROGRAMME OF FURTHER AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT
Comrades, the rates of growth of the economy as a whole, the rates at which the living standard of Soviet people rises, depend in many respects on the successful development of agriculture. That is why so much attention was devoted to it in the period under review. Since the problems of agriculture have been broadly discussed for quite some time and since many pertinent decisions were adopted in the past periods as well, the Central Committee considers it important to inform the delegates about some of the fundamental features of the approach to these problems worked out in these last few years.
One of them is that, adhering firmly to the course set by the March (1965) CC Plenary Meeting and consolidated in the decisions of the 23rd Congress, the Central Committee has laid special stress on creating stable economic conditions stimulating the growth of agricultural production. In specific terms, for collective and state farms this means stable procurement plans for a number of years ahead, introduction of such incentive prices for products delivered in excess of the plan as would stimulate the growth of production, and other measures.
The other feature is that, since we regard isolated measures of an agro-technical and organisational nature as insufficient, we have striven to take into account the whole set of factors determining the development of agriculture, including those of supplying the countryside with the necessary machinery and fertilisers, expanding capital construction, land improvement, personnel train-
46ing, and improving the organisation of production. This has necessitated a concrete analysis of the needs of agriculture and finding the means to meet them.
On the basis of this approach, the Central Committee at its July (1970) Plenary Meeting worked out a broad, comprehensive agricultural development programme, long-term and realistic. The problems of agriculture are such, comrades, that they cannot be completely resolved in a year or two, or even in five years; it will take a much longer time and require huge allocations^ and enormous effort not only by the farm workers, but by all our industry. The targets of the present five years are based on the decisions of the Plenary Meeting. Their fulfilment will amount to an increase of farm production enabling us systematically to expand and improve in the years to come the supply of the population with farm produce and of industry with raw materials. While dealing with the current tasks, we must at the same time take a big step forward in the new five-year period in building up the material and technical basis of agriculture, which will help us in future to resolve completely the problems of agricultural production and of the transformation of the countryside, and to reduce the dependence of farming on the elemental forces of nature.
These were the guidelines which the Central Committee followed in determining the size of investments in agriculture. Some 129 thousand million rubles, or as much as in the two preceding five-year periods combined, will be invested in farming by the state and the collective farms.
The nature of the tasks to be carried out in the new five-year period determines the growing measure of responsibility of the agricultural organs, rural Party organisations, collective and state farms. Collective farmers and state-farm workers are to raise the average annual grain output to at least 195 million tons, increasing its sale to the state under the fixed plan and in excess of the plan at higher prices, to 80-85 million tons. In the coming five years the average annual production of meat is to exceed 14 million tons, milk 92 million tons and eggs 46 thousand million. A considerable increase is also envisaged for.other farm products.
In accordance with the decisions of the July Central Committee Plenary Meeting, large sums of money and considerable material resources are being set aside for the fulfilment of these assignments. Compared with the previous five years, our agriculture will have many more new tractors, combines, lorries and other farm machinery, mineral fertilisers and various other chemicals, equipment for livestock and poultry farms, electric power and building materials. The exact figures are known to the delegates from the draft Directives.
All this is a real and very large contribution to agricultural pro-
47duction, to making it more effective. At the same time, we should like specially to stress that it is necessary to make the fullest possible use of the available potentialities, of everything that agriculture already possesses. Regrettably, there are still many shortcomings and drawbacks in this respect.
Comrades, as before, increasing grain production is still one of the main tasks in agriculture. Our grain needs have been growing from year to year. This applies not only to food grain, but also to forage grain, the production of which should be expanded in view of the necessity of rapidly developing animal husbandry.
As the Central Committee sees it, considerable potentialities exist for increasing the gross grain yield both in our main grain.- growing areas such as the Ukraine, Kazakhstan, the Central chernozyom zones, the Northern Caucasus, the Volga Area and the steppelands of the Urals and Siberia, and in the non-chernozyom and other zones of the country. These potentialities consist in a more effective use of fertilisers and machinery, and in a rigorous observance of agro-technical rules, in improving the organisation of work and perseveringly combating losses of grain, and, to be sure, also of other farm products.
The collective and state farms, and the agricultural organs, must persevere in the effort to improve the pattern of the cultivated land, giving priority to those crops and varieties which yield the biggest harvests. In the southern regions, for example, such as Stavropol Territory and Rostov, Poltava and a few other regions, the maize area has been unjustifiably reduced. This situation should be remedied. Also to be increased is the production of groats, primarily buckwheat and millet. The paddy systems envisaged in the plan are also to be put into operation on schedule, so that rice production should rise to 2 million tons towards the end of the five-year period, which will satisfy the country's demand in full.
We also face the acute and important agricultural problem of further expanding animal husbandry. A big advance must be accomplished in this field if we want to provide the population with unintermittent supplies of the most valuable food products and satisfy the growing requirements of the Soviet people in the new five-year period. Here, too, the potentialities available on the collective and state farms should be more fully mobilised.
To begin with, they must consolidate the feed resources, the basis for expanding animal husbandry. Improving the meadows and pastures and utilising them more fully, increasing the stocks of hay, grass meal and haylage, silage and other juicy feed, and raising the yields of all forage crops, is still an important task. All steps must be taken to reduce livestock losses from disease and poor management. Much wrill have to be done to build and mechanise livestock units, improve pedigree breeding and expand beef cattle and poultry farming.
48At present, personal auxiliary husbandry still plays an appreciable role in the production of meat and milk. However, here and there this does not get the attention it deserves. While concentrating the main attention on increasing social production, the necessary help should be given collective farmers and state-farm employees in acquiring livestock and poultry and the essential supplies of feed.
It should be noted that the possibilities of expanding animal husbandry are not yet being fully utilised in some republics and regions. This applies to the Moldavian, Armenian, Georgian and Turkmen Union republics, to the Voronezh, Omsk, Chelyabinsk and Kostroma regions of the Russian Federation, Odessa Region in the Ukraine, Karaganda and Pavlodar regions in Kazakhstan, and a few others. We hope that the local authorities will draw proper conclusions from this.
Apart from increasing the production of grain and developing animal husbandry it is of great economic importance to expand the production of other farm products, including industrial crops. Increasing the area of meliorated land and introducing crop rotation in Central Asia, particularly Uzbekistan, will help increase the production of so valuable a crop, so essential for the country, as cotton.
Comrades, our plans closely align the solution of the current questions of this five-year period with the basic long-term trends in the development of agriculture. The Party has defined the ways of solving this problem. First and foremost, the reference here is to the further technical re-equipment of agriculture, to its mechanisation and chemisation and to large-scale land melioration.
It follows that increasingly broader use of the country's general economic potential is a necessary condition for the successful development of agriculture. That is why the Party has so urgently set the task of the accelerated development of those branches of industry which manufacture means of production for agriculture and equipment and machinery for processing, transporting, storing and marketing farm products.
Thus, agricultural growth depends not only on the collective farmers and state-farm workers, but also, in many respects, on the efforts of the workers in industry, science and technology. The Party calls on them to contribute creditably to this big, truly countrywide, national cause.
In the years to come, specialisation of farming and industrial methods of producing meat, milk and other products will be still further developed. This is natural, for those are processes that shape the future of our agriculture in the long run. But in carrying out this big and important work, it is our duty to avoid mistakes and not to overreach ourselves. Increased specialisation and conversion to industrial lines should be economically substantiated and thoroughly prepared in each concrete case.
49The rapid growth of agriculture leads increasingly to the spread of inter-collective-farm and state-collective-farm production associations and the establishment of agro-industrial complexes. These are able to make more effective use of equipment, investments and manpower, and make broader use of industrial methods. The Party will support these forms of organising production in the countryside.
Comrades, fulfilling the farm output assignments will require arduous effort. A big role in raising farming is to be played by the rural Party organisations, government and land authorities and the managers of state and collective farms. The Party highly appreciates their selfless work.
On behalf of the Congress, allow me to express confidence that the efforts of the collective farmers, the state-farm workers and the agricultural experts will be crowned with new major successes.
TO EXPAND THE PRODUCTION OF MANUFACTURED CONSUMER GOODS
Comrades, as we have already mentioned, in the past five-year period the production and sale of manufactured consumer goods were considerably increased. Yet the output of many items is still lower than is required. The planned increase of the people's cash incomes will step up the demand still more, and will pose the problem of quality still more sharply.
Is our industry ready to rise to the new requirements set by the Party's orientation on the further improvement of the living standard?
It is unquestionably ready for this from the standpoint of its objective resources. The country's industrial potential is large enough considerably to increase the production and to improve the quality of consumer goods. The increased economic possibilities enable us to allocate larger sums for investment in this area, and this is what we are doing.
But as in any other undertaking, success depends not only on the objective conditions, for the subjective factors, too, are enormously relevant. The Central Committee considers it important, therefore, to draw the attention of the planning and economic authorities, of Party, government and trade-union organisations to the necessity of radically changing the approach to consumer goods production.
We have many years of heroic history behind us, comrades, when millions of Communists and non-Party people consciously accepted privations and hardships, were content with the bare essentials and denied themselves the right to demand any special amenities. This could not but reflect on their attitude to the production of consumer goods, to their quality and range. But that
50which was explicable and natural in the past, when other tasks, other undertakings stood in the forefront, is unacceptable in the present conditions. And if some comrades tend to overlook this, the Party is entitled to regard their attitude as stemming either from a failure to*understand the substance of its policy, oriented on a steady rise of the living standard, or as an attempt to vindicate their own inactivity. The Central Committee considers it necessary to raise this issue incisively and frankly.
We still have administrators, and this not only locally but in the centre as well, who manage to "coexist peacefully" with shortcomings, who have somehow reconciled themselves to the low quality of some consumer goods, and who are unfolding consumer production with unpardonable slowness. Some go so far as to cut or even stop the production of needed items, or stop producing commodities that, though inexpensive, are essential for the population, on the pretext of replacing outdated goods with new ones. That is how shortages arise from time to time of goods usually known as ``trifles''. But there is no such thing as trifles when it comes to items in daily demand.
We are equipped to improve the supply of consumer goods considerably in the new five-year period. It is planned appreciably to increase the production of textiles, garments, shoes and knitted goods. In the case of such durables as TV sets, domestic refrigerators, radio receivers and washing machines there is a real possibility of almost fully satisfying the needs of the population. The sale of cars will increase greatly: their 1975 output will be nearly four times that of 1970.
We are now unquestionably up to coping with these tasks; we must only make the most of the available reserves and possibilities. They are available in each ministry, each republic and region, each city, each enterprise.
In the new five-year plan 8.7 thousand million rubles, or nearly twice as much as in the preceding five-year period, is allocated for the development of light industry, and almost 14 thousand million rubles for the development of the food, meat, dairy and fishing industries. These sums must be put to use correctly and on schedule, so that enterprises should be built or reconstructed rapidly and equipped with up-to-date plant. This sets highly responsible tasks for our engineering industry, our researchers and designers. Also essential here is constant control by Party and economic bodies.
The big and complicated task of saturating the market with consumer goods must be carried out with state retail prices remaining stable, and, moreover, as the necessary economic preconditions are created, price reductions should follow for some consumer items. Cases where prices are inflated should be firmly combated, control over the fixing of retail prices and service charges should be tightened, and those heads of enterprises and economic organs
51that try to go round the procedure established by the state should
be taken to task.
Attaching great importance to satisfying consumer demand, the Central Committee considers it necessary to work out shortly a broad programme for increasing consumer goods production in all branches of industry. Fulfilment of that programme will contribute greatly to the improvement of the living standard of the Soviet people.
TO DEVELOP TRADE AND IMPROVE COMMUNITY SERVICES
The further rise of the standard of living sets higher demands on trade and services. In recent years, much has been done to develop these branches.
Tens of thousands of new shops, department stores and other trading establishments have been opened in the towns and rural areas. But we still have many flaws in the domain of trade and services, with which, regrettably, some of the people concerned have reconciled themselves, have become accustomed to regarding them as being practically normal. In many cases, trading establishments are inexpeditious and have not learned yet to properly study the market demand. As a result, goods reach the shops out of season or go anywhere but the places where they are needed. Also, it has often happened that some commodities are ordered in unjustifiably small quantities, with the result that their production is reduced, creating acute shortages. This was the case now with domestic sewing machines, now with pressing irons and other goods. In many cases, too, the service in the shops leaves much to be
desired.
The Soviet people, the Party respect the work of those engaged in trade. But in addressing them, and particularly managers of trade organisations, we should like to say that the present task is greatly to improve the standard of work, improve the organisation of trade, and to introduce modern trading methods.
Much attention is being paid in our country to public catering. We are building and will continue to build many more eating places, cafes and restaurants, though there are still many shortcomings in this field, and especially in the organisation of catering in enterprises, offices, educational establishments, collective and state farms. All too often the eating places are not big enough and the fare is not tasty. That is not to be tolerated. We must deal more strictly with the ministries, the local authorities and the heads of enterprises for these deficiencies. An important role should also be played by the trade unions: they must control the catering in enterprises unrelentingly and constantly.
Comrades, we must substantially improve the work of all the services---public catering, tailoring and dress-making, repair servi-
52ces, and recreation and entertainment facilities. Those are not industries that must merely fulfil plans, but services that deal directly with people, with the diversity of their tastes, their feelings and moods. To reduce the work of the services merely to fulfilment of plan percentages and profits is obviously out of the question.
The people's need for services is increasing steadily. To satisfy it more fully it is envisaged in the new five-year period to at least double the volume of paid services afforded to the population.
Here, too, we should think of utilising the potentialities. Much depends on local initiative, including that of the local Soviets. Among other things, we should also examine the question of creating conditions in which pensioners, housewives and invalids could do some work in the service industry without overtaxing themselves and with benefit for themselves and for society, either at home, under an individual arrangement, or by forming co-- operatives. Accordingly, we shall of course have to improve the corresponding legal provisions regulating such activity, to give it the necessary backing.
Briefly, the service industries merit the closest attention both from the standpoint of allocations for their development and the standpoint of improving the body of their personnel, and of elevating the social standing of the people working in them.
Those, comrades, are the main trends in our activity, aimed at raising the standard of living of the working people. In this context, the new Five-Year Plan should be a big step forward and, at the same time, it should lay the foundation for still more considerable achievements in future.
To cope successfully with these tasks, our cadres---economic, government, trade union and Part}', in the centre and locally--- should be as exacting and discriminating in all matters relating to the living conditions of people as they would with regard to the most important government assignments. That is the attitude the Party expects of them.
3. TO ENHANCE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF SOCIAL PRODUCTION ON THE BASIS OF SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL PROGRESS AND FULLER USE OF
ALL POTENTIALITIES
Comrades, allow me to proceed to the second fundamental question of our economic policy---the resources that we must mobilise to fulfil our tasks. Where can we obtain these resources and, in particular, the means for the accelerated development of the branches which we are accentuating?
Something may be obtained by re-locating resources from one
53branch to another, but that source is naturally limited. The socalled extensive factors of economic growth, too, are becoming more limited; the supply of additional manpower will decline in 1971-1975 as compared with the previous five years. And the rates of growth of investment also have their limits.
Consequently, we must rely mainly on enhancing the effectiveness of production. In simpler terms, the crux of the problem is to achieve a substantial increase of output and of the national income per unit of labour and material and financial inputs. That, in the final analysis, is what raising the productivity of social labour
amounts to.
Higher labour productivity in the coming five years should yield at least 80 per cent of the accretion in the national income, 87-90 per cent of the accretion in industrial production, 95 per cent of the accretion in building and assembly, and the entire accretion in railway freight carriage. The envisaged accretion in farm output must be secured entirely by raising the productivity of labour.
It is precisely from this angle---bearing in mind the need for speeding up the growth of 'the productivity of labour---that we should approach the main questions of economic development. In so doing, acceleration of scientific and technical progress forges into first place both from the point of view of the current tasks and that of the long-term perspective.
THE SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL REVOLUTION. FUSION OF SCIENCE
AND PRODUCTION
For Soviet science and technology the past five years have been a period of rapid development and we are legitimately proud of its gains. All the same, rapid acceleration of scientific and technical progress is still one of the main tasks. At a time when the role of science as an immediate productive force keeps growing, separate scientific achievements, no matter how brilliant, are no longer central; what is central is a high scientific and technical level of production as a whole.
For our science this poses still more responsible tasks, requiring its higher effectiveness, a further unfolding of fundamental research, and concentration of the scientists' energy and attention on the most important and promising long-term trends in scientific and technical progress. Research and design organisations and pilot enterprises must take more pains in perfecting new machinery and new production processes for adoption in the economy. The tasks facing the State Committee for Science and Technology, the Academy of Sciences and the ministries, are becoming greater.
If we examine all the links of the intricate chain that binds science to production, we shall easily see that the weakest links are those relating to the practical realisation of scientific achieve-
54ments, to 'their adoption in mass production. To be sure, we have many positive examples in this field; suffice it to recall, say, the work of the Paton Electrical Welding Institute or the development work on isoprene rubber. Unfortunately, however, this is far from being the rule in all cases.
To eliminate the existing difficulties we should achieve a still greater reorientation of the respective scientific organisations on the most important production problems, on the one hand, and, on the other, create conditions compelling enterprises to manufacture the latest types of products, to literally chase after scientific and technical novelties, and not to shy from them, figuratively speaking, as the devil shies from holy water. Those collectives that really fight for modernising plant and production processes, for producing output meeting the latest demands, should be put in a more privileged position.
The national economic plan should become a powerful lever of scientific and technical progress. So far, our plans have dealt with questions relating to the use of achievements of science and technology in the economy to an insufficient extent, and, what is more, a considerable number of the ministries have been falling short of the set targets. This applies, among others, to the Ministry of the Timber and Wood-Working Industry and the Ministry of Tractor and Farm Machinery Engineering. The approach should be different. What we need is a comprehensive programme for the further development of plant and technology, one which would take into account all the sections of the plan, its main indicators. This approach is already reflected in the draft Directives.
To accelerate scientific and technical progress it is important to improve the forms of organising industry, securing, so to speak, the kind of production pattern that would be abreast of the demands of the times. This implies a considerable extension of research and studies in industry itself, the establishment in the enterprises of design bureaus, of a resourceful experimental base, and an influx into industry of a large number of researchers. Naturally, only big amalgamations and combines can accomplish this, which makes their establishment particularly topical. In many cases good results may be obtained by merging research institutions with enterprises, creating powerful science-production complexes. Relevant are the problems of improving scientific and technical information and working out effective methods of control and of independent, extra-administrative experts' panels, which would preclude the creation of machines, devices and production processes falling short of the top modern requirements.
It is essential, comrades, that not only our planning and economic organs, but also all Party cadres should display a full measure of concern for accelerating scientific and technical progress. The importance of this derives both from the vital needs of our present-day economic practice and from future requirements.
55Scientific and technical progress is the main lever for building the material and technical basis of communism. In so important a matter as developing science and technology, therefore, we should see the long-term prospects clearly and take them into account in our practical work.
And the prospects are that the revolution in the development of the productive forces, touched off by science and its discoveries will become increasingly significant and profound. The task we face, comrades, is one of historical importance: organically to fuse the achievements of the scientific and technical revolution with the advantages of the socialist economic system, to unfold more broadly our own, intrinsically socialist, forms of fusing science with
production.
As we take steps to speed up scientific and technical progress, we must see to it that it should combine with the rational treatment of natural resources and should not cause dangerous air and water pollution or exhaust the soil. The Party demands most emphatically that the planning and economic bodies and design organisations, all our cadres, should keep the question of nature protection within their field of vision when designing and building new enterprises or improving the work of existing ones. Not we alone, but the coming generations should also be able to use and enjoy all the gifts of our country's splendid natural environment. We are also prepared to participate in collective international schemes for nature protection and the rational use of natural resources.
TO IMPROVE THE STRUCTURE, ENHANCE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION
Comrades, the policy of increasing the effectiveness of production poses a number of important and complicated tasks aimed at securing the most effective proportions of the economic branches.
The rates of economic growth, the possibility of accumulation required for the development of the economy and for raising the living standard depend in many ways on a correct solution of the structural problems. Everybody knows that the effect per invested ruble is greater in some branches than in others, that investments are recouped more quickly in some branches than in others. It is important to bear this in mind in any economy, and doubly so in a big one like ours.
Apart from increasing material benefits for the people, the acceleration in the development of agriculture, of industries manufacturing consumer goods and of the service industries will help improve the proportions in our economy, help to balance it, to expand the sources of the growth of the national income and of accumulations, and to step up the circulation of money.
56Improvement of the structure of heavy industry contains considerable potentialities for increasing the effectiveness of production. This implies accelerated development of those of its branches which secure lower production costs, bigger output of the end product and a higher labour productivity both in heavy industry and in other sectors.
In the years ahead the work of raising the effectiveness of production in industry should follow several basic directions. One of these is cutting down on the consumption of materials per unit of production, economy of raw and other materials. This is of truly national importance.
The growth of the national economy creates a rapidly increasing demand for various raw materials. To meet this demand we shall continue to expand the extractive industries at a high rate. In so doing, it is important to proceed so as to achieve their more effective operation, securing fuller processing of raw materials, improving quality and reducing waste. It should be borne in mind, however, that the extractive industries are much more capital- and labour-intensive per unit of production than the manufacturing industries.
Consequently, from the standpoint of the national economy, it is much more advantageous to economise on raw materials by perfecting production in the manufacturing industries, rather than additionally to produce that much more raw materials. Reducing the per unit consumption of materials by a mere one per cent on a countrywide scale is equivalent to an additional 3-4 thousand million rubles' worth of accretion to the national income.
The other important direction in working for the greater effectiveness of production is to use the manpower resources more rationally, to reduce labour outlays, principally by cutting down on manual and physically arduous labour. Apart from improving production processes and the organisation of labour in enterprises, this requires an all-round development of those industries which secure a boost in the rate of renewing and replacing obsolete plant. This applies to industries manufacturing new highly-productive equipment, whole systems of machines facilitating conversion to comprehensive mechanisation of j'obs and automated production processes. Of great importance, too, are expanding branches that provide technical services to industry and mechanise ancillary jobs.
And the third direction is a substantial improvement of the quality of products and, accordingly, the development of production sectors that facilitate the solution of this, problem. In the present conditions, seen from the standpoint of its effect for the entire national economy, better nearly always also means more. One up-to-date programmed machine tool replaces ten of obsolete design, one heavy-duty lorry replaces several ordinary ones and
57one aircraft engine with a longer life-span replaces two or three
of the old type.
To raise the effectiveness of industrial production and improve its structure, we are setting our course on improving whole complexes of inter-connected industries, the development of which follows a definite programme.
A more effective priority development of the fuel and power complex is one of the key objectives in the coming five years. We shall work for it by improving the structure of the pertinent branches, accelerating the growth of those which are the most promising and economically effective. First and foremost, this means increasing the share of oil and gas in the country's fuel balance and technically reequipping the coal industry, starting up highly economical hydraulic and thermal stations, building more atomic power stations, and raising the economic effectiveness of power
installations.
Responsible tasks face the metallurgical industry and engineering. Here, too, factors assuring higher effectiveness of production are being placed in the fore.
This requires improving production processes and modernising the operating metallurgical enterprises, and expanding those sectors of production which secure the improvement of the quality and extension of the grading range of metals, and a higher output of precision shapes and blanks.
The engineering industries should develop along the same lines. They will concentrate on increasing the output of high-powered, highly-economical, high-precision and dependable machines and equipment. It is planned to increase the share of forge and press machines, and of foundry and assembly equipment, and to give priority to the expansion of the manufacture of programmed machine tools and automated and semi-automated transfer lines.
Electronics, the radio industry and instrument-making, that is, the entire complex of industries creating the technical basis for automating production and management will continue to develop at a high rate. This complex may be legitimately described as the catalyst of scientific and technical progress. Here, particular importance attaches in the coming five years to organising largescale manufacture of sophisticated electronic computers.
In the new five-year period, much attention is devoted to the development of the chemical and petrochemical industry. Chemisation of the economy is a powerful lever for increasing the effectiveness of social production. There are many uses to which chemicals can be put in most branches of the economy, replacing expensive natural raw materials, helping to improve the quality of the products and to raise the productivity of labour.
In recent years, work was begun on radically altering the organisation of production in the timber, wood-working, and pulp and paper industry. The task is to increase considerably the output
58of what is the end product of that industry---timber, woodpulp, paper, cardboard, furniture and fibre boards---without substantially expanding timber felling.
In the present stage of economic development the role increases of those branches of the national economy which service the production process, such as transport, communications, material and technical supplies, and others. The effectiveness of the economy depends largely on the work of these branches, in which nearly 16 million of our people are employed. Although substantial advances have been made in this sphere, it requires consistent improvement; its development must be brought into line with the increasing volume and complexity of production.
The work of the transport system, for example, does not meet the present requirements; it has become a bottleneck. One of the reasons for this, apparently, is that insufficient funds were allocated for transport development in the preceding five years.
Measures are envisaged in the ninth five-year period to remedy the situation. It is planned to build new and increase the carrying capacity of the existing railway trunk lines and station side-tracks, to build new motor-roads and pipelines, and to continue expanding the maritime and river merchant fleets. On the Kama River construction has begun of a major plant that will produce 150 thousand heavy-duty lorries annually; one more auto works will be built; work has begun on the construction site of a new large railway-car plant in Abakan. In view of the vastness of our country ever growing importance attaches to the further development of air transport. We shall put into operation new types of highly-economic, comfortable planes and improve the airport ground services. In the new five-year period Aeroflot, which is already the world's largest airline, will carry almost 500 million passengers and 11 million tons of freight. Growing importance also attaches to such aspects of the use of our civil aviation as assistance to agriculture and the health services, forest protection and participation in geological surveying. While further developing all types of transport, there is need to ensure their more co-ordinated operation, to create a single and highly efficient transport system for the country.
Radio, television and all types of communications will be developed on the basis of the latest scientific and technical achievements.
Improving the system of foreign economic relations offers considerable opportunities for increasing the effectiveness of the economy. Political factors relating to the consolidation of the socialist community and the strengthening of the economic basis of the peaceful coexistence of states, as well as factors stemming from the requirements of our economy, make it important to increase the output of export goods in all branches of industry. This will also help enlarge imports of needed commodities. Be-
59yond question, expanding international exchanges will have a beneficial effect on improving the work of all our industry.
The increased role of economic, scientific and technical contacts with other countries will, of course, require certain measures designed to improve the administration of all foreign economic activity and eliminate any short-sighted approach in this important field. Foreign economic activity must be based increasingly on a combination of production and commercial functions so as to react quickly to the requirements and possibilities of the world market and to use them to the utmost in the interests of our economic development.
TO IMPROVE UTILISATION OF PRODUCTION ASSETS AND INVESTMENTS
Comrades, the Soviet Union now possesses a vast economic potential and the effectiveness of our economy depends increasingly on how this potential and, above all, the operative production assets, are used. Improving their use and raising the productto-assets ratio is still one of the most important tasks, though our industry has made some advances in this respect in the past five
years.
In this connection, I should like to draw attention to just one question of the low shift coefficient of industrial enterprises. This was discussed at the 23rd Congress and at a number of CC CPSU Plenary Meetings, but matters have practically not improved, especially in the engineering industry. Instead of increasing the number of shifts, some economic organs want to build more and more new enterprises. And when the question of increasing the number of shifts is raised, it is countered by references to manpower shortages. But who, may we ask, will work in the new enterprises---people or the holy spirit? No, comrades, we must deal with the matter more strictly, work out and carry through a set of measures ensuring fuller use of the equipment; we must place the matter under the strict control of the Party committees in the enterprises, the city and regional Party committees.
This will help to resolve one of the most urgent problems of our national economy---the problem of capital construction.
In the sphere of material production we are now building more than any other country in the world. Older people remember what noteworthy events the commissioning of the Dnieper Hydropower Station, the Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works and the Volgograd and Kharkov tractor factories were in our history. Many larger and technically more advanced enterprises and projects are now being placed in operation every year. The major projects completed in recent years included the Krasnoyarsk Hydropower Station (the biggest in the world), the unique Kona-
60kovo, Burshtyn and Krivoi Rog thermal power stations; the giant West-Siberian and the Karaganda iron and steel works; the oilproducing complexes in Tyumen Region and Western Kazakhstan; the Volzhsky Auto Works and Pavlodar Tractor Works; huge chemical complexes and plants, the Bratsk and Syktyvkar timbering complexes. Construction of the Chernogorsk Worsted Mill, the Kursk Knitwear Factory and other large enterprises of the light and food industries has been completed.
However, the situation as regards capital construction cannot be considered satisfactory. To put the matter briefly, the problem is that we are investing enormous sums of money while the returns are not fast enough, and, consequently, smaller than they should be'. There are several reasons for this.
One is that when plans are drawn up they frequently envisage excessively large volumes of capital construction and an excessively large number of projects without taking real possibilities into account. As a result, funds are scattered, the number of unfinished projects grows and large resources are frozen.
Every time state plans are considered it is found necessary to cut the requests of ministries and Union republics. But even these plans are not entirely fulfilled. Nonetheless, many comrades continue to submit obviously overstated requests. It is time this practice was ended. We must build and live, according to our means. Another reason for the difficulties lies in the irrational distribution of considerable part of the capital investments. Experience shows that, as a rule, it is economically more profitable to ensure a growth of production by reconstructing and technically modernising factories. But a much too large share of the funds is still channelled into new projects and a clearly inadequate share is used for the modernisation of production and the renewal of plant, with the result that the reconstruction of many factories is intolerably dragged out. In the coming five-year period the emphasis must be on enlarging and reconstructing operating enterprises.
Lastly, there are major shortcomings in construction itself. Plan and financial stipulations are sometimes violated. Insufficient use is made of new, effective materials and building elements. The quality of construction remains poor. It must become a law that no economic executive should start the building of new projects without blueprints and estimates.
In recent years the Central Committee and the Council of Ministers of the USSR have made a detailed and comprehensive analysis of the state of affairs in capital construction. A number of decisions have been passed which change the very principle by which the work of builders is evaluated: this evaluation must be based on end results, the commissioning of capacities, and the completion of the entire volume of construction, and not on various intermediate stages.
61However, in order to effect a radical improvement of the situation in capital construction, very much remains to be done also by the Party organisations concerned with this important sphere of the national economy and, of course, by the builders themselves.
change in their approach to economic questions, and modify some of their habitual conceptions.
For historical reasons, by virtue of the conditions in which we found ourselves, things developed in such a way that quantitative assessments were always given priority: the point was to produce so many Ions of steel, so many of oil, so many of grain, and so many tractors. Of course, the quantitative side continues to be of importance for us even today. But it must be more fully and consistently supplemented with indicators bearing on the quality of products and on the economic aspect of industrial operations. For example, when this or that executive reports on output, a well-grounded evaluation of his work may be given only when the cost at which this has been achieved is established. And where the cost has been excessive or where his enterprise has fulfilled the plan, but failed in its inter-enterprise delivery commitments, letting down other enterprises, where success in one sector has led to falling short elsewhere, such an executive does not merit praise but criticism. We criticise our executives when they make mistakes or commit this or that offence. This is right, because our standard of exactingness must be raised. But we feel that there must be criticism not only of those who make mistakes but also of those who fail to use all the possibilities for developing production, and fail to display initiative, and sit on their hands.
Our success in fulfilling the plans the Party has put forward for the current five-year period will be the greater, the higher the standard of exactingness all of us apply to our own work and to the work of others.
Comrades, the analysis of the possibilities at the disposal of our national economy shows that we do have reserves for making production more efficient and accelerating economic growth, and that these reserves are very considerable. As has been said, these reserves lie in scientific and technical progress, improvement of the structure of the national economy, fuller use of production assets and improvement of capital construction. But that is not the whole point, for these reserves are also available at every individual enterprise, at every collective and state farm.
What I have in mind is eliminating losses in working time, reducing in changeover of personnel, ensuring smooth operation, and putting a stop to the idling of equipment. Much importance attaches to the saving of raw and other materials, fuel and electric power, careful handling of machinery, machine tools and equipment, tractors, harvesters and motor vehicles. There is now such a vast quantity of diverse machinery in the country that if we use it ineptly or less than fully we tend unjustifiably to reduce its service life, and this inflicts considerable damage on the people's interests. At each individual plant or collective farm the effort to achieve economies may yield hundreds or thousands of rubles, but on the scale of the national economy this will come to many hundreds or even thousands of millions of rubles.
A year ago the CC CPSU, the Council of Ministers of the USSR, the Ail-Union Central Council of Trade Unions and the CC of the Ail-Union Leninist Young Communist League addressed a letter to the Soviet working people on improving the use of reserves in production and intensifying the effort to achieve savings in the national economy. This letter has become the basis of extensive work amongst the masses, which has yielded good results. But the use of all the reserves, greater efforts to save, and the combating of mismanagement, wasteful and superfluous spending involve more than a short-term campaign. This is one of the most important lines in the day-to-day activity of Party, government, economic, trade union and Komsomol organisations. We must do our utmost to intensify our work in this direction. The Central Committee considers it necessary to emphasise that for the successful fulfilment of the tasks of the new fiveyear plan it is important to have our cadres make a definite
624. TO IMPROVE THE SYSTEM OF ECONOMIC MANAGEMENT
Comrades, the third key question of the Party's economic policy is improvement of the system of economic management. This is essentially a matter of how best to organise the activity of society in accelerating economic and social development, in ensuring the fullest use of the available possibilities, and in rallying even closer together hundreds of thousands of collectives, and tens of millions of working people round the main aims of the Party's policy. Consequently, questions relating to management affect not only a narrow circle of executives and specialists, but all Party, government and economic organisations and all collectives of working people. This means that improvement of management is an important component part of the Party's entire activity in directing the economy. That was precisely the stand taken by the Central Committee at its December (1969) Plenary Meeting.
Why is it that questions of management have now acquired especial urgency?
63It is above all because, as has been said, the growing scale of and the qualitative shifts in our economy now make new and higher demands on management, and do not allow us to be satisfied with the existing forms and methods, even where they have served us well in the past.
Another thing to bear in mind is that the possibilities for improving management have been markedly extended in the recent period. This is due to the higher level of knowledge and professional training of our cadres, and of the broad masses of working people, and to the rapid development of the science of management and computer techniques.
The political aspect of this question is also very important. The uninterrupted operation of the economic mechanism helps to create a good and businesslike atmosphere in the country, promotes labour enthusiasm among the broad masses, and leads to growth of initiative among the working people, because then the people see that their labour efforts produce the expected results, that they benefit the people and the whole of society. And, conversely, nothing so tends to cool people's ardour as ill-considered decisions and bungling or bureaucratic practices on the part of individuals, which result in the wasteful use of labour, social resources and created values.
In the period under review, much work has been done in the sphere of improving the economic mechanism. Following the reestablishment of the sectoral system of management the level of centralised direction of the national economy has been substantially raised. In accordance with the Party's decisions, industry has been switched over to a new system of planning and provision of economic incentives, and this has made it possible to stem some undesirable tendencies in the economy of which there had been signs in earlier years. The line for the further development of democratic principles has been expressed in the broader enlistment of the working people in the management of production, in the extension of the economic competence of the republics and regions, and also in greater operational independence for the enterprises.
At the same time, life and practice---and they are the best teachers---show that we cannot rest content with what has been achieved. Improvement of the system of management is not an ad hoc measure but a dynamic process of solving problems brought up by life. We shall have to continue to focus our attention on these problems in the future.
In this context it appears to be appropriate to deal briefly with some matters which, the Central Committee believes, are of
great importance.
On planning. Under socialism, planning is the central element, the core of national-economic guidance. Our country has major achievements in this sphere and justifiably takes pride in them.
64But we cannot afford to mark time, we must continue to work hard to improve both the theory and the practice of national-- economic planning.
The further raising of its scientific level becomes a task of primary importance. There is an urgent need to improve our planning methods. Planning must rest on a more precise study of social requirements, on scientific forecasts of our economic possibilities, on all-round analysis and evaluation of different variants of decisions, and of their immediate and long-term consequences. In order to fulfil this responsible and complex task there is need to broaden the horizons of economic planning.
With ever greater frequency we are confronted with the fact that fulfilment of the most important economic and socio-political tasks requires a much longer term than five years. This raises the question of planning national-economic development over a long term, on the basis of forecasts of the country's population growth, the requirements of the national economy, and scientific and technical progress. This approach, ensuring constant co-- ordination of long-term plans with five-year and annual plans, can help in the more effective solution of the basic problems of our development.
The comprehensive approach to planning and the adoption of major national-economic decisions acquire ever greater importance. The very nature of the tasks before us is such that their fulfilment, as a rule, calls for concerted efforts by many branches and economic areas and includes implementation of a whole system of diverse measures.
Do we have any positive experience in this sphere? To be sure, we do. To take only the last few years, there we have the programme for boosting agriculture, the programme for developing the vast oil-bearing region in Western Siberia, the space exploration programme, and others. We are now faced with a more detailed formulation of many other long-term programmes and their co-ordination with the overall plans for the country's economic development.
In planning work fuller account should be taken of local specifics. In our vast country, with its diverse conditions, this task is of primary importance. We must continue our work to improve the territorial location of production.
Science has greatly enriched the theoretical arsenal of planning, by producing methods of economico-mathematical modelling, systems analysis, and so on. Wider use of these methods must be made, and sectoral automated management systems must be created more rapidly, considering that in the future we shall have to create a nation-wide automated system for collecting and processing information. This makes it important not only to fabricate the necessary equipment but also to train considerable numbers of skilled personnel.
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Comrades, all the successes of our socialist economy are connected with economic planning. Future economic achievements will also largely depend on the quality of planning. That is why we must continue to concentrate our attention on its improvement. We must work consistently to enhance the responsibility of our cadres for the fulfilment of state plans and targets, and for strengthening planning discipline in every link of the nationaleconomic mechanism.
On improving the organisational structure of management. Life, the development of the productive forces, has also raised questions of improving the structure of economic management and specifying the functions of individual organs. What does this mean in concrete terms?
It means above all the need to enhance the role and improve the work of the State Planning Committee and other all-Union state organs. To do this they should apparently be released from a considerable part of their routine business, to allow them to concentrate their attention on the main problems of national-- economic development. Another pressing question is to enhance the role and extend the independent initiative of ministries and departments, which also requires some specification of their functions.
There is need for greater concentration of production. The experience we have accumulated shows that only large associations are equal to the task of concentrating sufficient numbers of qualified specialists, ensuring rapid technical progress, and making better and fuller use of all resources. The line of forming amalgamations and combines should be followed more boldly: in the long term, they must become the main units of social production operating on a profit-and-loss basis. In setting up such associations it is especially important that administrative boundaries and departmental subordination of enterprises should not be an obstacle to the introduction of more efficient forms of management. The process of concentration must also develop in agriculture.
In improving the structure of management the Party believes it to be important consistently to practice the Leninist principle of individual responsibility for assignments. When a decision is taken it must be made perfectly clear who is responsible for it. Similarly, it must be made clear who is responsible when a decision that is ripe for adoption is not adopted or is delayed. It is important to define at every level of management the volume and the balance of rights and responsibility. Great powers with little responsibility create possibilities for arbitrary administrative acts, subjectivism and ill-considered decisions. But great responsibility with little power is not much better. In that position, even the most conscientious worker frequently finds himself powerless, and
66it is hard to make him fully responsible for the job assigned to him.
In order to eliminate too many levels in management, we must seek to have decisions on most questions taken once and for all, instead of being passed on from one level to another. Every link in the management system must see to its own work to prevent the higher levels from being cluttered up with a mass of minor matters which distract them from the major problems, and to allow the lower levels to deal efficiently with the matters falling within their competence. That seems to be right.
Improvement of the management structure requires a consistent struggle against any manifestations of the narrowly departmental and short-sighted approach.
On increasing economic incentives. In its work to improve the guidance of the national economy, the Party has firmly followed the line of correctly combining directive assignments by central organs and the use of economic levers for exerting an influence on production. These levers---cost accounting, prices, profit, credit, forms of material incentives, and so on---are designed to create economic conditions promoting the successful activity of production collectives, millions of working people, and to ensure wellgrounded evaluations of the results of their work. The need for precisely defining the measure of labour and the measure of consumption demands skilful use of all these levers, and improvement of commodity-money relations.
The delegates to the Congress know that some measures have been taken along these lines in accordance with the decisions of the Central Committee's Plenary Meeting in September 1965 "On Improving Industrial Management, Improving Planning and Increasing Economic Incentives in Industrial Production." The experience of past years gives us grounds for saying that having begun the economic reform, the Party has correctly assessed the situation and steered a true course in improving the management of the national economy. However, far from all problems have been resolved.
The experience that has been accumulated has made it more obvious where effort has to be concentrated. This is the creation of the economic conditions, which would, first, induce enterprises to undertake optimal commitments, i.e., adopt maximum plans and make more rational use of capital investments and labour resources, second, ensure the maximum acceleration of scientific and technical progress and the growth of labour productivity and, third, facilitate a consistent drive for higher quality in production. The consistent implementation of the principles of operation on a profit-and-loss basis remains an urgent task at industrial enterprises, at collective and state farms and at higher economic levels. The role of economic contracts and the responsibility for honouring them must be enhanced. Stable plan targets and eco-
3*
67nomic norms calculated for a number of years must be worked out for amalgamations and industrial enterprises.
A major aspect of economic activity, on which the efficacy of production depends to a large extent, is the improvement of the system of payment for work. Conscientious, highly productive work must be encouraged and better remunerated. It would be expedient, as the experience of the Shchekino Chemical Works shows, to provide enterprises with broader possibilities for giving incentives to those workers and collectives of workers who make the largest contribution to the development of production, combine trades and adopt a master-like and thrifty attitude to social wealth. An increase of material incentives must go hand in hand with the promotion of moral incentives for work.
In short, comrades, the Party organisations, our economic organs and the collectives of workers have to put in a lot of hard work to improve the economic methods of management.
In this connection, a word must be said also about the responsibility that devolves on Soviet economic science. It has achieved certain successes in recent years. But the swift development of the national economy and the new tasks confronting it are bringing to the fore many intricate theoretical and practical problems that require inremitting attention from both economic
bodies and scientists.
On broader participation of the people in economic management. One of the Party's central tasks is to draw the working masses into the management of production on an ever larger scale. What we must achieve is, as Lenin emphasised, that every working person, every politically-conscious worker should feel "he is not only the master in his own factory but that he is also a representative of the country" (Collected Works, Vol. 27,
p. 403).
We have immense possibilities for this. The people's participation in economic management is not confined to resolving economic tasks in individual production collectives. A broader approach has to be adopted to this, in view of the role which our Party and the Soviet slate play in economic management. Their policy, including their economic policy, is dictated by the basic interests of the working people. It is charted by representatives of the working people in the elective organs, with the masses participating broadly in the discussion of major plans and decisions. The working people also actively take part in the control of the fulfilment of these decisions. The Party will continue to promote all these forms of socialist democracy.
A big role is played in economic management by the primary Party organisations, which unite millions of workers, collective fawners and office employees. Utilising their right to control the economic activity of enterprises, they effectively influence matters concerning production. A big role is played by the trade
unions in resolving economic problems, promoting socialist emulation and mass technical innovation and strengthening labour discipline.
In the period under review there has been a marked upswing of activity by production conferences, workers' meetings and general meetings of collective farmers. Concern must be shown to secure a further enhancement of their authority and bring the key questions of the life of the enterprises up for their discussion. It is necessary to encourage the practice of the heads of amalgamations and enterprises and also of top-level officials of ministries regularly accounting for their work directly to the workers.
Alongside questions of production, questions of labour protection and the improvement of everyday conditions must, naturally, receive the closest attention of the collectives. The practice of drawing up plans for the social development of collectives deserves encouragement. The procedure of concluding and checking collective agreements should be improved.
It is our duty to translate Lenin's behests still more fully into life and get all the workers, collective farmers and intellectuals to become conscious fighters for the implementation of the Party's economic policy, to act like statesmen and fully display their abilities, initiative and economic acumen.
Comrades, in the long run the success of the Party's plans for economic development and raising the people's standard of living depends on people. The guarantee of further achievements in communist construction lies in the conscious and persevering labour of workers, peasants and intellectuals, of our Party, government, trade union and economic cadres.
That is precisely why our economic programme must be reinforced by broad Party-organisational, political, ideological and educational work that can set in motion all the gigantic forces inherent in the socialist system and in the Soviet man, who combines the remarkable features of fighter, toiler and creator.
Our purpose is to make the life of Soviet people even better, even more attractive, even happier. We are marching forward to many years of selfless and inspired labour, giving fully off' our creative energy. For us this is the only way to welfare and happiness, to a radiant communist future.
69 68III.
Socio-Political Development of Soviet Society and the Tasks of the Party
Comrades, in the course of the past five years the Central Committee has devoted considerable attention to questions concerning the socio-political and cultural development of Soviet society. Allow me to report what has been done in that sphere.
1. CHANGES IN SOCIETY'S SOCIAL STRUCTURE. THE FURTHER STRENGTHENING OF THE SOVIET PEOPLE'S UNITY
In raising and resolving problems of our political system's further development and questions of an ideological nature, the Central Committee's point of departure is that the Party's policy yields the required results only when it fully takes into account both the interests of the entire people and the interests of various classes and social groups, and directs them into a single common
channel.
The Party's policy is directed towards helping to bring the working class, the collective-farm peasantry and the intelligentsia closer together, and gradually erasing the essential distinctions between town and countryside and between brainwork and manual labour. This is one of the key sectors in the building of a classless communist society.
In our country the drawing together of all classes and social groups, the moral and political upbringing of the Soviet people and the strengthening of their social unity are being achieved on the basis of Marxist-Leninist ideology, which expresses the socialist interests and communist ideals of the working class.
The working class is the most numerous in our society. During the past five-year plan period the number of workers increased by approximately eight million. The working class has been considerably augmented by state-farm workers. Workers comprise more than 55 per cent of the employed population. But the place occupied by the working class in socialist society is determined not only by its numerical strength, which can change depending on economic development and the rate of the scientific and technical revolution. The working class has been and remains the main productive force of society. Its revolutionary spirit, discipline, organisation and collectivism determine its leading position in the system of socialist social relations.
The leading role of the working class as the builder of communism is consolidated with the growth of its general cultural
70and educational level and of its political activity. The growth of the cultural level of the working class is convincingly shown, in particular, by the last two censuses. In 1959 there were 386 workers with a higher or secondary education per 1,000; today this figure tops 550.
Today there is a steadily growing number of workers who have completely mastered their trade and who, having a secondary education, are continuing their studies and mastering the advanced achievements of science and culture. As a rule, these workers are politically active and they regard the interests of their enterprise and the entire country as their own. The entire mass of Soviet working people look to these workers as models and it is only natural that in recent years the stratum of workers has been steadily growing in the Communist Party, and the number of representatives of the working class has been increasing in the Soviets of Working People's Deputies and in our public organisations.
The Party will continue to direct its efforts to securing the growth and strengthening of the influence of the working class in all spheres of the life of our society and to making its activity and initiative more fruitful.
Our society's political foundation is the alliance of the working class with the peasantry. The Party's policy and its practical measures to promote both industry and agriculture have led to a further consolidation of this great alliance.
The growth of the productive forces of agriculture, the gradual conversion of agricultural labour into a variety of industrial work, the cultural upsurge in the countryside and the remaking of rural life have led to changes in the peasant's social make-up and way of thinking. He now has more and more features in common with the worker. The number of collective farmers whose work is directly linked with machines and mechanisms is growing steadily, and the educational level of the collective-farm peasantry is rising. On the eve of the Great Patriotic War only six per cent of the working people in the countryside had a higher or secondary education. According to the figures for the close of 1970, more than half of the rural population have finished a secondary school or an institution of higher learning. That is a great victory for our society!
The appearance of an increasing number of inter-collective and mixed state- and collective-farm production associations and enterprises is giving rise to substantial social changes.
The new and more complex machinery---powerful tractors, harvester-combines and lorries---supplied to the countryside, the growth of the peasants' standard of living and the gradual improvement of cultural and everyday conditions are making agricultural labour more attractive and interesting, particularly for young people, and are giving them the opportunity of acquiring
71high qualifications. As a result, after finishing educational institutions the rural youth now stay to work in the countryside more willingly. This is a positive trend and it merits every possible support, especially as the development of agricultural production requires the training of more skilled cadres for the countryside.
You will recall that the Third All-Union Congress of Collective Farmers adopted the new Model Rules of the Collective Farm. A Union Council of Collective Farms and collective-farm councils of district, regional, territorial and republican levels have been elected. They represent the interests of the peasants. All this is of cardinal importance to the life of the countryside and to the development of collective-farm democracy.
Naturally, comrades, the Party is well aware that much still remains to be done in the way of promoting culture, improving everyday life and, this must be specially stressed, construction in the countryside. In this respect there is a lot of ground to be covered. But we have no reasons for underestimating what has already
been accomplished.
The drawing together of the working class, the peasantry and the intelligentsia is among the paramount social changes in our society. This process has now become increasingly more marked. Our Soviet intelligentsia sees its mission in devoting its creative energy to the cause of the people, to the cause of building a communist society. Numerically, the intelligentsia continues to grow quickly. The number of scientific workers, engineers, technicians, agronomists, teachers and doctors is increasing, and in recent years the rate of growth of the scientific and technical intelligentsia in the Soviet Union has exceeded the rate of growth of all the other social groups. This is a natural process. It is a result of the Party's policy of achieving the utmost acceleration of scientific and technical progress and further raising the cultural and educational standard of the people.
To a great extent our intelligentsia, particularly the scientific and technical intelligentsia, is replenished from the ranks of the workers and peasants. The following is a typical example. At the Pervouralsk Pipe Works 42 per cent of the engineers and technicians are of working-class stock, 32 per cent of peasant stock and 26 per cent from the families of office employees. The situation is approximately the same at other industrial enterprises in
our country.
Comrades, in its policy our Party has taken and will go on taking into consideration the interests of such large social groups as young people, women and pensioners.
I shall speak of young people and of the Party's work among them when I come to the activities of the Lenin Komsomol. At this point I should like to underscore only one thing, and it is that the Party has been and shall go on giving much of its attention to the problems, cares and interests of young people. More
72than half of our country's population are young people under 30. They are our future and our replacement.
On the Party's initiative a series of important measures has been put into effect during the past five years to improve the working conditions for women and, at the same time, lighten their household chores. Let me remind you at least of the fact that maternity leave procedures have been extended to collective-farm women and more creches, kindergartens and everyday service establishments have been opened. You all know, comrades, that further steps in this direction have been planned for the next fiveyear period.
The aim of the Party's policy is that Soviet women should have further possibilities for bringing up their children, for taking a larger part in social life, and for recreation and education, and that they should have greater access to the blessings of culture. All these are important tasks, and the new five-year plan will be a noteworthy stage in their implementation.
A large group of our society consists of pensioners, of labour and war veterans. The delegates to this Congress know that in recent years citizens going on pension have been given wider opportunities to take part in labour activity. Many Party organisations are evolving useful forms of work with pensioners. But we shall act correctly if we take steps to employ the experience and energy of our veterans more extensively in social and labour activity.
Comrades, one of the greatest achievements of socialism is the practical implementation by the Party of the Leninist national policy, a policy promoting equality and friendship among peoples.
Many of the fraternal republics recently marked their 50th anniversaries. This was an imposing demonstration of the florescence of socialist nations, of the monolithic unity of all the peoples of our country. Next year we shall mark the 50th anniversary of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. For its political significance and socio-economic consequences the formation of the USSR occupies a prominent place in the history of our state.
All the nations and nationalities of our country, above all, the great Russian people, played their role in the formation, consolidation and development of this mighty union of equal nations that have taken the road to socialism. The revolutionary energy, dedication, diligence and profound internationalism of the Russian people have quite legitimately won them the sincere respect of all the other peoples of our socialist motherland.
Further progress along the road of the all-round development of each of the fraternal Soviet republics, along the road of the further gradual drawing together of the nations and nationalities of our country, has been made during the past few years under the Party's leadership. This drawing together is taking place under conditions in which the closest attention is given to na-
73tional features and the development of socialist national cultures. Constant consideration for the general interests of our entire Union and for the interests of each of its constituent republics forms the substance of the Party's policy in this question.
The Party shall continue to strengthen the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, consistently pursuing the Leninist line of promoting the florescence of the socialist nations and securing their gradual drawing together. The Party shall continue to educate all the working people in the spirit of socialist internationalism, intolerance of nationalism, chauvinism, national narrowness and conceit in any form, in a spirit of profound respect for all nations and nationalities.
A new historical community of people, the Soviet people, took shape in our country during the years of socialist construction. New, harmonious relations, relations of friendship and co-- operation, were formed between the classes and social groups, nations and nationalities in joint labour, in the struggle for socialism and in the battles fought in defence of socialism. Our people are welded together by a common Marxist-Leninist ideology and the lofty aims of building communism. The multi-national Soviet people demonstrate this monolithic unity by their labour and by their unanimous approval of the Communist Party's policy.
The past five-year period has witnessed a further advance towards the consolidation of our society's unity. We shall go on doing everything to strengthen the community of interests of all the classes and social groups of our country in order to promote the process of drawing them together.
2. STRENGTHENING OF THE SOVIET STATE. DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIALIST DEMOCRACY
Comrades, during the period under review the Party has accomplished considerable and extremely diverse work aimed at further strengthening the Soviet state and perfecting the entire political organisation of our society. The principal orientation of this work---in accordance with the tasks of communist construction---has been and remains the further development of socialist democracy.
In our country, as everybody knows, the organs of people's power---the Soviets of Working People's Deputies---are the foundation of the socialist state and the fullest embodiment of its democratic nature. This, comrades, is a mighty force. Today they comprise over two million deputies, who administer the affairs of our state of the entire people at all its levels. With them at the Soviets there is an army of 25 million activists, dedicated voluntary assistants.
74Permit me to remind you that the need to enhance the role of the Soviets was underscored in the decisions adopted by the 23rd Congress of the CPSU. To achieve this a lot has been done over the past years. To this end the powers of the district, town, rural and settlement Soviets have been extended also in such an important field as co-ordinating, within the limits of their competence, the work of factories and economic organisations situated in their territories. Their material and financial resources have been enlarged and they are getting more trained personnel.
The work of the Soviets has, on the whole, become more active and many-sided. The deputies now meet more regularly with their electorate and give an account of their work to them. Also important is the fact that the press, radio and television are gradually making it a practice of reporting the work of the Soviets more fully.
Greater control is exercised by the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and the Supreme Soviets of the Union republics over the work of ministries and departments and over the state of affairs in the key sectors of economic and cultural development. The larger number of standing commissions and the more efficient organisation of their activities are enabling the deputies to display more initiative, delve deeper into the work of the executive bodies and participate more actively in drafting laws.
The Party attaches great importance to perfecting Soviet legislation. During the period under review attention was concentrated on the legislative regulation of questions such as improving the public health services, strengthening family relations, further bettering labour relations and ensuring nature conservation and the rational utilisation of natural wealth. On all these questions the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and the Supreme Soviets of the Union republics have passed the appropriate laws after broad discussions with the participation of millions of citizens.
Another point, comrades. There is now a pressing need for a special law defining the status, powers and rights of deputies--- from the Supreme to the settlement Soviets---and also the duties of officials with regard to deputies. It seems to me that the passage of such a law would enhance the authority and activity of deputies.
The successful realisation of the tasks facing us presupposes the precise and efficient work of the state apparatus. Hence the increased demands made on the administrative apparatus. The introduction of modern means and methods of administration begun in recent years, creates the condition for a more rational organisation of the administrative apparatus, for cutting its operational costs and reducing its personnel. Steps have already been taken in this direction and they shall be continued.
Most of the employees of the state apparatus are highlytrained, conscientious and considerate people. Their work merits
75the highest appreciation and respect. But it must be admitted that there still are callous officials, bureaucrats and boors. Their conduct evokes the just indignation of Soviet citizens. Relying on public support, the Party is and will go on making resolute efforts to achieve more efficiency in the work of the administrative apparatus.
The way we see it efficiency in administration organically 'combines an attentive, solicitous attitude to the needs and cares of the working people with a prompt consideration of their applications and requests. An atmosphere of good will and of respect for man must reign in every institution.
In Soviet socialist democracy an important place is occupied by the organs of people's control, in whose work millions of factory and office workers and collective farmers now take part. The Party will continue doing everything to secure the steadfast implementation of Lenin's precepts on costant and effective control
by the broad masses.
Comrades, an important feature of the socialist system is that in our country the working people participate in the administration of society not only through state organs but also through a ramified network of mass organisations, above all, such as the trade unions and the Komsomol.
Today our trade unions have more than 93 million members. This is practically the entire working class, the whole of the working intelligentsia and numerous sections of rural workers.
The trade unions are one of the key links in the general system of socialist democracy, in drawing the working people into the administration of the affairs of the state and society. They participate in solving many problems of economic development--- from the drawing up of state plans to the management of each enterprise. They play an important role in the production and social work of the personnel of factories, building projects and offices. They help to inculcate a communist attitude to labour and social property, and work to satisfy the cultural and everyday requirements of the people and protect their health.
The safeguarding of the legitimate interests of the working people remains one of the basic tasks of the trade unions. It is no secret, for example, that we still have enterprises where over-time is systematically practised, where people are unnecessarily deprived of days off and where, here and there, labour safety is poorly organised. The trade unions can do much to eliminate these abnormal phenomena.
The Party's line is to continue enhancing the role and efficiency of the trade unions. Without assuming petty tutelage over the trade unions, the Party organisations must do everything to promote their activity and initiative, strengthen them with cadres and make more exacting demands on Communists working in trade unions.
76The Party will continue giving constant support to the trade unions as the largest organisations of the working people and seeing to it that they are able to fulfil their role of school of administration, school of economic management and school of communism more fully and successfully.
In the country's social and political life an important place belongs to the Lenin Komsomol, which unites over 28 million young men and women. It would be hard to name a sector of economic and cultural development where the energy, creative initiative and ardour of Komsomol members have not been displayed. Organisation of Komsomol shock building projects, team contests of skill by young workers, students' building detachments, youth production brigades and summer work and recreation camps are the concrete and vital tasks being accomplished by the Komsomol, which is the leader of Soviet young people.
The Komsomol's central task has been and continues to be to bring up young people in the spirit of Communist ideals and devotion to our Soviet motherland, in the spirit of internationalism, and actively to propagate the norms and cultural values of our society.
The different groups of our young people---young workers, collective farmers, specialists, students and schoolchildren---have their own special features. The Komsomol must be able to work with each of these groups. On it largely depends the correct and timely vocational orientation of young men and women, and the education of the rising generation in a spirit of profound respect for work at factories, farms and in the fields.
In recent years there has been a considerable extension of the Komsomol's range of tasks in questions of the labour, education, recreation and everyday life of young people. Party organisations have begun to show more determination in assigning responsible sectors of work to Komsomol members. The Komsomol is now more active socio-politically. An indication of this is that over half a million young people have been elected to organs of state power---the Soviets of Working People's Deputies. Nearly 20 per cent of the deputies to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR are young people.
The Party constantly draws new forces from the Komsomol. In the period after the 23rd Congress 45 per cent---or 1,350,000 ---of new members came from the Komsomol. During the same period the number of Communists working in the Komsomol has doubled. This conforms to the 23rd Congress directives on strengthening the Party nucleus in Komsomol organisations. It is worth making it a rule that Komsomol members admitted to the Party should continue working actively in the Komsomol until they are given other assignments by their Party organisation.
The Party is justly proud of the young builders of communism. Our duty is to pass on to the rising generation our political
77experience and our experience in resolving problems of economic and cultural development, to direct the ideological upbringing of young people and to do everything to enable them to be worthy continuers of the cause of their fathers, of the cause of the great
Lenin.
In the development of socialist democracy an important task is to enhance the role of our labour collectives, which are the basic units of socialist society. This is a major field of struggle for stepping up the labour and social activity of Soviet people. The new, socialist qualities of the working people and the relations of friendship and comradely mutual assistance take shape in these collectives. The responsibility of each to the collective and of the collective for each of its members is an inalienable feature of our way of life.
During the period under review the Central Committee and the Soviet Government have continued taking steps to strengthen legality and law and order, to educate citizens to observe the laws and rules of socialist community relations. The work of the militia, the procurator's offices and the courts has been improved.
In is not only the task of the state apparatus to strengthen legality. Party organisations, the trade unions and the Komsomol are in duty bound to do everything to ensure the strictest observance of law and improve the working people's knowledge of the law. Respect for legality and for the law must become part and parcel of the make-up of every person. This is particularly true of persons in office. No attempt to deviate from or to circumvent the law is to be tolerated, no matter what the motive. Nor can we tolerate any violation of the rights of individuals and infringement of the dignity of citizens. For us Communists, champions of the most humane ideals, this is a matter of principle.
The fight against crime remains a serious task. Stricter punishment has lately been stipulated for some kinds of crime. Alongside punishment, as provided by the law, a great measure of concern is displayed to find ways and means of discouraging and preventing crime.
In face of the continuing subversive activity by imperialism an important role is played by organs of state security. During the period under review they have been reinforced with politically mature cadres. The Party consistently educates the personnel of these organs in the spirit of Leninist principles, of absolute observance of socialist legality, in the spirit of unremitting vigilance in the struggle to safeguard Soviet society against the actions of hostile elements and against the intrigues of imperialist intelligence services.
Comrades, everything created by the people must be reliably protected. To strengthen the Soviet state means to strengthen its Armed Forces and -raise our country's defence capability to the
78highest possible level. As long as we live in a troubled world, this will remain one of the most important tasks!
The Soviet Army is part of our people and shares their interests. In our country military service is not only a school of combat skill. It is also a good school of ideological and physical steeling, of discipline and organisation.
Carrying out the people's will, the Communist Party works tirelessly to strengthen the country's defence. Questions relating to the development of the Armed Forces were among our main concerns during the period under review. The measures taken in recent years have made it possible substantially to strengthen the might and combat capability of the Armed Forces. The Soviet people may rest assured that our glorious Armed Forces are prepared to repel an enemy attack at any time of the day or night from any quarter. Any possible aggressor is fully aware that in the event of attempting a nuclear-missile attack on our country he will be dealt a devastating counterblow.
When speaking of the glorious Soviet Army, we must say a few good words about our war veterans, about the soldiers and commanders who defended our country's freedom in the Great Pa.triotic War. They had not even had time to rest after the tremendous tension of the war years: the war veterans once again found themselves at the front---the labour front. Many of our wartime comrades are no longer here with us. But millions are still on active duty. Some continue to serve in the army, others are giving the country the benefit of their knowledge and labour at the factories and construction sites, on collective and state farms, in scientific institutes and schools. Let us wish them all sound health, happiness and fresh successes in their endeavour for the sake of communism!
Comrades, as you know, questions of democracy are now the crux of the ideological and political struggle between the world of socialism and the world of capitalism. Bourgeois ideologists and revisionists raise a hypocritical hue and cry, alleging that we have no democracy. They offer us all sorts of ``advice'' on how to ``improve'' and ``democratise'' socialism. But their concern is not for socialism, of course. They would like to return us to bourgeois practices and, therefore, try to force bourgeois democracy on us, a democracy for exploiters, alien to the interests of the people.
A vain, useless venture. Soviet people have their own democracy, a socialist democracy, with their own principles and traditions for developing it. There is no freedom in general, just as there is no democracy in general. This is a class concept. That is how Lenin put the question, and that is how our Party puts it today. We see the meaning and content of socialist democracy in the increasingly broader participation of the masses in the administration of state and social affairs. In our country the
79entire political system of society and the steadily growing initiative of the people serve the building of communism. This sort of democracy is vital to us and it is an indispensable condition for the development and consolidation of socialist social relations.
The Party's constant concern is that our socialist democracy should steadily develop and that every person should feel he is a citizen in the full sense of the word, a citizen interested in the cause of the entire nation and bearing his share of the responsibility. The Party will go on consistently implementing this very line.
3. MOULDING OF THE NEW MAN---ONE OF THE PARTY'S MAIN TASKS IN COMMUNIST CONSTRUCTION
A prominent place in the Party's work during the period under review has been the further promotion of all forms of ideological work, the political education of the masses and the raising of the people's cultural level. A great project---the building of communism---cannot be advanced without the harmonious development of man himself. Communism is inconceivable without a high level of culture, education, sense of civic duty and inner maturity of people just as it is inconceivable without the appropriate material
and technical basis.
The moral and political make-up of Soviet people is moulded by the entire socialist way of our life, by the entire course of affairs in society and, above all, by purposeful, persevering ideological and educational work by the Party, by all its organisations.
The formation of a communist world outlook in the broad mass of the people and their education in the spirit of the ideas of Marxism-Leninism are the core of all ideological and educational work by the Party.
But even the most advanced ideology becomes a material force only when, having won over the masses, it induces them to take 'energetic action and determines the norms of their day-- today behaviour. One of the paramount objectives of the Party's ideological work is to foster in Soviet people the new, communist attitude to work. This is an immense task. Experience very convincingly shows that Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was right when he emphasised that it "will take many years, decades, to create a new labour discipline, new forms of social ties between people, and new forms and methods of drawing people into labour. It is a most gratifying and noble work" (Collected Works, Vol. 30, p. 518). These are remarkable words! We must draw conclusions
from them.
The triumph of socialism in our country has given rise to unprecedented manifestations of mass labour enthusiasm such as the Stakhanovite movement, the movement for a communist at-
80titude to work, and so on. The past five-year period has produced many new developments in this respect. Labour emulation has assumed truly nation-wide dimensions.
The task, as the Party sees it. is to support the mass movement for a communist attitude to work and give every encouragement to the creative initiative of Soviet people. In recent years, as you are aware, we passed a number of resolutions on encouraging and disseminating such mass initiative of the people in town and countryside as the socialist emulation movement in honour of the 50th anniversary of the Great October Revolution and in honour of the centenary of the birth of V.I.Lenin, and the nation-wide Lenin subbotnik. The Central Committee gave its approval to the outstanding initiative of workers' collectives of Moscow and Leningrad, who, faithful to the glorious traditions of their cities, launched an emulation movement for the fulfilment of the Five-Year Plan ahead of schedule. Moreover, the Central Committee gave its support to the concrete production undertakings of metalworkers, oilmen, miners, car-builders, transport workers and other contingents of working people.
In recent years much has been done in the way of fostering in Soviet people pride for their country, for their people and their great achievements, and a feeling of respect for the outstanding achievements of the past.
Great importance attaches to the work that is being done by the Komsomol, the Voluntary Society for the Promotion of the Army, Air Force and Navy and also by other organisations and sports societies to train young people to defend their country. The patriotic theme is worthily expressed in many works of Soviet literature and art. Initiative by our young people, such as mass tours of places of revolutionary, military and labour glory and other undertakings, merit approval.
Monuments to military glory have been erected in scores of our towns and in thousands of villages, and majestic monuments stand in Volgograd, Leningrad, around Moscow, in Smolensk Region, Byelorussia, the Ukraine, the Baltic republics and the ' Caucasus as testimony of the Soviet people's unbounded respect for the memory of heroes who gave their lives for the motherland. The Party highly values the patriotic spirit of Soviet people and their readiness to devote themselves wholly to promoting their socialist motherland's prosperity and defending the gains of the Revolution and the cause of socialism.
Comrades, the new make-up of the Soviet man, his communist morals and outlook are consolidated in constant and uncompromising struggle with survivals of the past. Communist morals cannot triumph without a determined struggle against their antitheses such as money-grabbing, bribe-taking, parasitism, slander, anonymous letters, drunkenness and the like. The struggle with what we call survivals of the past in the minds and actions of
81people is a matter that requires constant attention by the Party and all the conscious, advanced forces of our society.
During the period under review the Party CC has taken steps to create in our society a moral atmosphere that would help to establish a respectful and solicitous attitude to people, honesty, exactingness to oneself and others, and trust combined with strict responsibility and a spirit of true comradeship in all fields of social life, in work and everyday relations. In short, our aim has been that in our country everybody should live and work better. It goes without saying that it is hard to express the results of this work in figures, in statistics. However, every Soviet citizen evidently feels the improvement of the moral atmosphere in our Party and our society. We shall continue steering this very course. Comrades, for the transition to communism it is necessary to achieve a higher level of development not only in the economic field but also in the culture of society as a whole.
What can we say about the work of the Party and, generally, of the state of affairs in education, science and art in recent years?
In the Directives of the 23rd Congress of the CPSU the task was set of completing the transition to universal secondary education in the main by the end of 1970. To this end the network of general education (day and evening) and specialised secondary schools (technical schools, and so on) was additionally enlarged and the number of other vocational schools giving their pupils a complete secondary education was increased. As a result, although we were unable to reach the set target we have drawn much closer to it: today about 80 per cent of the pupils finishing an eight-year school go on to receive a complete secondary education. We feel that one of the most promising ways of implementing universal secondary education (while preserving the leading role 'of the general education school) is to build more vocational schools offering a secondary education.
The number of institutions of higher learning has continued to grow. More than 60 new institutions of higher learning, including nine universities, were opened during the past five years. Today not only every Union republic but also many Autonomous republics have their own universities.
Extensive work has also been done to renew the content of the study process itself in our schools and institutions of higher learning. It is being brought more into line with the requirements of scientific and technical progress and with the general level of modern scientific knowledge.
The development of all links of public education has resulted in the complete fulfilment of another important directive of the 23rd Party Congress: over seven million specialists with a higher or secondary special education have been trained in the country
82during the past five years. This is a good and extremely needed addition to the army of builders of communism.
The public education system has to ensure the training of large contingents of specialists, including many new professions. Today progress is so swift in all fields that the education received by young people is only a foundation that requires the constant acquisition of knowledge. This makes the systematic improvement of the qualification of cadres extremely important.
Our Party spares no effort to ensure the fruitful development of the entire front of social and natural sciences.
The total number of scientific workers in the country has increased 40 per cent during the past five years and today adds up to nearly 930,000. New scientific centres are being built in the Urals, the Soviet Far East and the North Caucasus.
Extensive and fruitful work has been accomplished during the past five years by the Academy of Science of the USSR, which determines the strategy of scientific quests, brings to light the most promising trends and forms of research needed by society and unites the efforts of our scientists.
We note with satisfaction that in a number of very important branches our scientists have won leading positions in the world. It would be hard and even practically impossible to name all the directions in which scientific research is developing in our country, or to list even the major achievements in the fundamental and applied sciences.
In recent years Soviet scientists have given the motherland first-class automated transfer lines, laser devices, new types of electronic computers, the discovery of huge deposits of minerals, and much else. Space exploration has been crowned with further success. Much ground has been covered in this sphere during the past five years. Successful sustained group flights have been accomplished in piloted Soyuz spaceships. Excellent results have been obtained with automatic space vehicles: from the first-ever soft-landing on the Moon to the building of such sophisticated systems as Luna-16, which brought lunar rock back to the Earth, and Luna-17 with its tireless worker Lunokhod; from the first flights to Venus to the receipt of scientific data directly from its surface.
I have already spoken of the tasks of our scientists in the field of scientific and technical progress and the introduction of scientific achievements in production. The social sciences also face important tasks. In the period under review the CC CPSU adopted a special extended resolution on this question. The tasks of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism and of the Academy of Social Sciences under the CC CPSU have been enlarged and specified. In recent years a number of new humanitarian science institutes have been opened in the system of the Academy of Sciences and (his has made it possible to intensify the study of problems re-
83lated to the socio-economic development of the USSR and foreign countries and the world revolutionary process, and to improve scientific information. What we need is a more radical turn of the social sciences towards the elaboration of problems that are
and will be pressing.
Soviet science has impressive achievements to its credit. But there still are considerable shortcomings in the work of our scientific institutions. It is no secret that there are scientific workers who are, to this day, occupied with work that is to a large extent divorced from both the country's direct practical requirements and from the actual interests of the development of the fundamental branches of science. Actually, this is wasted effort. We cannot, of course, reconcile ourselves to this.
It is necessary to be more exacting in the selection of cadres for scientific work. It is important that in every scientific collective there should be a really creative atmosphere, an atmosphere of bold quest, fruitful discussion and comradely exactingness. Soviet people highly value the achievements of their scientists and they expect them to redouble their efforts in order to resolve the most pressing problems of communist construction. Comrades, with our society's advance along the road of communist construction a growing role is played by literature and art in moulding the outlook, moral convictions and spiritual culture of Soviet people. Quite naturally, therefore, the Party continues, as it has always done, to devote much attention to the ideological content of our literature and art and to the role they play in society. In line with the Leninist principle of partisanship we believe that our task is to direct the development of all forms of creative art towards participation in the people's great cause of
communist construction.
During the past five years our literature, theatre, cinema, television, fine arts and music have given Soviet people many new, interesting and talented works. New works and productions have appeared which deal with our people's past and present realistically, from Party positions, without embellishment and without playing up shortcomings, and concentrate attention on truly important problems of communist education and construction. These works are further confirmation that the closer the artist is to the manyfaceted life of the Soviet people the surer is the road to creative achievement and success.
During the period under review a prominent place in literature and art was held by the Lenin theme. A number of interesting novels, plays and films about Lenin, all of them permeated with revolutionary passion and the spirit of devotion to Leninism, were
brought out.
A highly satisfying fact is that literature and art are fruitfully developing in all our republics, in dozens of languages of the peoples of the USSR, in the vivid diversity of national forms.
84The congresses held in recent years by the unions of writers, artists, composers and film-makers of our country have been noteworthy landmarks in the development of Soviet art. They mirrored the indisputable growth of the ideological and political maturity of our creative intelligentsia, and of their responsibility for the content and artistic value of the works created by them. Thus, much has been done in recent years by Soviet people in the arts. Our people highly value their achievements, which are noteworthy contributions fostering communist consciousness in Soviet people.
However, it cannot be said that all is well in the realm of artistic creative work, particularly as regards quality. It would not be amiss to note here that we are still getting quite a few works that are shallow in content and inexpressive in form. We sometimes even get cases of works being dedicated to a good, topical theme but giving the impression that the artist has taken too insubstantial an approach to his task, that he has not put all his effort, his talent into it. It seems to me that we all have the right to expect those who are in the arts to be more demanding of themselves and of their colleagues.
The achievements of Soviet literature and art would have been unquestionably greater and shortcomings would have been eradicated quicker if our literary and art criticism pursued the Party line more vigorously, adopted a more principled stand and combined exactingness with tact and a solicitous attitude to the creators of artistic values.
Furthermore, sight must not be lost of the fact that in the development of our art there were complicating factors of another order. There were some people who sought to reduce the diversity of present-day Soviet reality to problems that have receded into the past for good as a result of the work done by the Party to surmount the consequences of the personality cult. Another extreme trend among individual men of letters was the attempt to whitewash past phenomena which ithe Party had subjected to emphatic and principled criticism, and to conserve ideas and views contravening the new, creative elements which the Party had introduced into its practical and theoretical work in recent years.
Essentially, both these cases were attempts to belittle the significance of what the Party and the people had already accomplished, and divert attention from current problems, from the Party's constructive guideline and the creative work of Soviet people.
Workers in literature and art are in one of the most crucial sectors of the ideological struggle. The Party and the people have never reconciled nor will ever reconcile themselves to attempts, no matter who makes them, to blunt our ideological weapon and besmirch our banner. If a writer slanders Soviet reality and helps
85our ideological adversaries in their fight against socialism he deserves only one thing---public scorn.
We mention these negative phenomena not because they have become appreciably widespread. The Central Committee feels that the Party's frank and principled attitude towards these phenomena helps writers and artists to work with greater confidence and conviction towards developing Soviet literature and art as they have been fruitfully doing for the past five years.
Soviet writers and artists have been educated by the Communist Party. They draw their inspiration from the deeds and thoughts of their people, and their creative destiny is inseparable from the interests of the socialist motherland.
We are for an attentive attitude to creative quests, for the full unfolding of the gifts and talents, for the diversity and wealth of forms and styles evolved on the basis of the method of socialist realism. The strength of Party leadership lies in the ability to inspire the artist with enthusiasm for the lofty mission of serving the people and make him a convinced and ardent participant in the remaking of society along communist lines.
Comrades, in addition to giving the working masses broad access to cultural values, socialism has made them the direct makers of culture. Striking evidence of this is the unparalleled scale of folk art. Today there are 13 million adults and 10 million schoolchildren in amateur art groups. The creative art of the people is a specific feature of Soviet reality, of our life.
Mass media---newspapers, magazines, television, radio and news agencies---are a powerful instrument in the important and complex work of moulding the new man and in the ideological struggle against the capitalist world.
During the period under review the Party's Central Committee has time and again considered questions relating to the mass media with the aim of securing an improvement of their work and further enlarging their audience.
Our press, radio and television are doing much to ensure quick reporting of the pressing problems of the country and international affairs that really interest Soviet people. They help to disseminate the advanced experience of communist construction and give a rebuff to the ideological sallies of the class enemies. The mass media have been given greater technical facilities and more material resources. The daily circulation of the newspapers in our country runs to nearly 140 million, while the magazines have a circulation of over 150 million. There has been a particularly large increase in subscriptions to newspapers and magazines in the countryside, where the curculation has exceeded 107 million as against 65 million five years ago.
The demand for books is enormous in our country. It is rightly regarded that the Soviet people read more books than any other nation in the world. Suffice it to say, that books with a total
86printing of over 6.5 thousand million copies, including more than one thousand million copies of socio-political books, have been published since the 23rd Congress of the CPSU. In 1969 and 1970 alone the total printing of the works of Lenin and books on Lenin and Leninism exceeded 76 million copies. During these years there has been an increased demand in our country for books from the fraternal socialist countries. From 1966 to 1970 their translations have been published in the USSR in a printing of 72 million copies.
Our TV network now has a huge audience---70 per cent of the country's population. The Orbita TV network covering the Extreme North, the Soviet Far East, Siberia and Central Asia, has now become operational.
Comrades, ideological work, propaganda and mass agitation are an important and responsible field of the Party's activities. A lot has been done in this field. But it must be noted that we are not yet fully satisfied with the state of affairs in it. The Central Committee feels that it is necessary to intensify our entire ideological work, above all, to make more active and purposeful the propagation of communist ideals and the concrete tasks of our construction. In the immediate future efforts to give the working people a thorough understanding of the purport and significance of our Congress decisions must become the crux of Party propaganda and mass agitation. Our cardinal task in this sphere is to be able really to convey our ideological conviction in full to the masses, and approach the work of the communist education of the Soviet man in a really creative manner.
We are living under conditions of unabating ideological struggle, which imperialist propaganda is waging against our country, against the world of socialism, using the most subtle methods and powerful technical means. All the instruments that the bourgeoisie has of influencing minds---the press, cinema and radio---have been mobilised to delude people, to make them believe that under capitalism they are living in a near-paradise, and to slander socialism. The air is virtually befouled with all sorts of fabrications about life in our country and in the fraternal socialist countries.
It is the duty of our propagandists and mass agitators to give a timely resolute and effective rebuff to these ideological attacks and tell hundreds of millions of people the truth about the socialist society, the Soviet way of life and the building of communism in our country. This has to be done with purpose, convincingly, intelligibly and vividly. The truth about the Soviet Union must be heard in all the continents.
Thus, comrades, a considerable place in the Party's activities during the period under review was occupied by questions relat-
87ing to the socio-political development of Soviet society, the ideological and political education of the working people and the development of science and culture. Substantial headway has been made in these fields of communist construction, but there are big and difficult tasks ahead. We are certain that the Party will carry them out successfully and that it will have the unanimous and vigorous support of the entire Soviet people.
The strength of our country lies precisely in the unity and political consciousness of the people. The Party will tirelessly reinforce this source of our strength---the inviolable ideological and political unity of the Soviet people.
of Party development. Experience has shown that these were correct and viable instructions.
The period under review witnessed the further growth of the Party membership and a qualitative improvement of its composition. There are now in the CPSU 14,455,321 persons, of whom 13,810,089 are members and 645,232 are probationary members. Nine per cent of the country's adult population are Communists. The Party composition is: 40.1 per cent workers, 15.1 per cent collective farmers, and 44.8 per cent office workers. Here it must be borne in mind that more than two-thirds of these office workers are engineers, agronomists, teachers, doctors, scientific workers, and workers in literature and art.
Three million people have been admitted to the CPSU since the 23rd Congress. Of these almost 1,600,000 or more than half are workers. In large industrial areas such as Moscow, Leningrad, Sverdlovsk, Gorky, Donetsk, Karaganda and some other regions 60-70 per cent of the probationary members are workers. The Congress instructions that the working class must occupy the leading place in the Party's social composition have thus been consistently carried out. We shall continue this line because it fully conforms to our Party's nature and to the place and role of the working class in Soviet society.
It must be noted that Party organisations have become more attentive to the question of enrolment in the Party and are placing more demands on those who wish to join the Party. As a result, there has been a certain diminution of the number of people joining the CPSU. Whereas an average of 760,000 people were annu-
~^^1^^ ally accepted into the Party as probationary members in the interim between the 22nd and 23rd Congresses, the annual average was 600,000 in the period between the 23rd and 24th Congresses. In this connection it must be re-emphasised that the improvement of the qualitative composition of its ranks must remain one of the Party's cardinal concerns. Excessive preoccupation with the
I enrolment of new members and an indiscriminate approach, which, regrettably, are still to be found in some organisations, run counter to the Leninist principles of Party development. Our task is to exert a regulating influence on the growth of the Party ranks, replenish them on the basis of individual selection of the most worthy representatives of the working class, the collective-farm peasantry and the intelligentsia, and to make sure that the Party composition allows the CPSU to carry out its tasks in the best possible way.
The Party rids its ranks of people who violate the Programme and Rules of the CPSU. It must be noted that the Party organisations have drawn correct conclusions from the instructions of the 23rd Congress and have begun to rid themselves more resolutely of those who violate Party or state discipline, or abuse their office,
~^^1^^ whose behaviour casts a slur on the name of Communist. In fu-
89IV.
Development of the Party and Some Questions of Inner-Party Life
Comrades, the main thing in the Communist Party's work is to map out the general prospects of social development, chart a correct political line and organise the working people to implement it. Our entire reality shows that the CPSU is honourably discharging its role of political leader of the working class and all working people, and guides the Soviet people along the correct way indicated by Lenin. The larger the scale of our creative work and the more difficult the problems that have to be tackled, the greater become the role and responsibility of the Communist Party, which leads the masses.
Our Congress will determine the political line and the concrete programme of work for the coming five-year period. In order to fulfil this programme successfully it will be necessary to mobilise all the strength of the Party and of the people. The forms and methods of the organisational and political work of the Party organisations and their leadership of economic and cultural development must conform as fully as possible to the spirit of our times and to the big tasks that the 24th Congress of the CPSU will set before the Party and the country.
1 GROWTH OF THE CPSU MEMBERSHIP AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF INNER-PARTY DEMOCRACY
Drawing upon the Leninist organisational principles and developing them in conformity with the new conditions, the 23rd Congress of the CPSU gave clear-cut instructions on the basic problems
88ture, too, we must not allow a conciliatory attitude to those who behave incorrectly. Concern for the purity of the Party ranks is the duty of all Party organisations and of every Communist.
Comrades, all these years our Party and its Central Committee have been indeviatingly following a line of further developing inner-Party democracy, observance of the Leninist norms of Party life and enhancement of the activity of Communists. The principle of electivity and accountability of leading organs is implemented consistently in the Party, and the spirit of collective leadership and collective work has been consolidated. Questions concerning the Party's work are discussed and decided on a broad democratic basis.
During the period under review there have been 16 plenary meetings of the Central Committee of the CPSU. I spoke of the basic questions examined at the plenary meetings and of the importance of the decisions passed by them when I dwelt on various aspects of the Party's work. Meetings of the Politburo of the CC to consider the most important and pressing problems of the Party's home and foreign policy are held regularly once a week. Every week there is also a meeting of the Secretariat of the CC, whose attention is centred chiefly on the selection of cadres and on verifying fulfilment of assignments. Local Party committees likewise hold regular plenary meetings and bureau sittings and operate as organs of collective leadership.
The democratic principles in the life and work of the Party were strikingly manifested also during the latest election campaign. The Party meetings were attended by over 90 per cent of the Communists, and more than three million people spoke at these meetings. The meetings, the Party conferences and the congresses of the Communist Parties of the Union republics were marked by lively activity and principled discussion of problems. At these meetings, conferences and congresses there was a purposeful exchange of opinion by Communists on the Party's policy and affairs, on the work of their own organisations, on successes and shortcomings, on unresolved problems and conclusions for the future. They showed that all the Party organisations wholeheartedly approve and support the Central Committee's internal and foreign policy. The monolithic unity and solidarity of the ranks of our great Leninist Party were demonstrated once again.
Many new people who had given a good account of themselves in practical work in recent years have been elected to the leading organs of Party organisations. They are workers, collective farmers, representatives of all the social strata and groups and of the nationalities of the country. Among them are people working in different state, social, economic and cultural sectors. A total of 423,000 workers and collective farmers have been elected to the bureaus of Party organisations and Party committees. This is a much greater number than two years ago. Of the members and al-
90ternate members of district and town Party committees nearly 40 per cent are workers and collective farmers. There is now a larger number of workers and collective farmers also in the regional and territorial committees and in the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union republics.
During the period under review there has been an improvement in inner-Party information. The Central Committee of the CPSU regularly informed the local Party organs, the aktiv and all Communists of the key problems of the Party's work and of the situation in and outside the country.
The information going from the bottom up to the Central Committee of the CPSU, has become more operational and purposeful. Such information helps to size up the situation more correctly and to take the experience and opinion of Party organisations and the working people more fully into account when resolving problems. We should continue to improve inner-Party information, make it more efficient and use it more widely as an instrument of leadership and a means of education and control.
Criticism and self-criticism, a tested method of eradicating shortcomings and improving the work, has been further developed in the practice of the Party organisations. Most Party committees have become more attentive to the critical remarks and suggestions of Communists and have intensified control over their realisation. At the same time, it must be emphasised that not all Party organisations and their leading organs have drawn the proper conclusions from the instructions of the 23rd Congress on this question. Some leaders lack restraint and tact, the ability to hear critical remarks out attentively and correctly react to criticism. But those who underestimate or ignore criticism are doomed to failure. Broad development of principled criticism and self-criticism is a sign of political health of the Party organisations, of their correct understanding of their duty towards the Party and the people.
The development of inner-Party democracy is inseparable from strengthening Party discipline. Experience confirms that in many ways the Party's strength and ability to function are determined by how consistently and correctly the principle of democratic centralism is implemented. Both anarchic lack of discipline, presented as democracy, and bureaucratic centralisation, hindering the promotion of the initiative and activity of Communists, are equally injurious to the Marxist-Leninist Party.
The work of the Party Control Committee under the CC CPSU has become more diversified. The Committee has begun to make a deeper analysis of questions related to the strengthening of Party discipline and to react more promptly to cases of misconduct by Communists. The Party Commissions of the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union republics and of territorial, regional, town and district committees have also become more ac-
91tive. It is important to continue strengthening discipline in the Party and secure the unconditional fulfilment of the requirements of the CPSU Programme and Rules by every Communist.
The question of changing Party membership cards has now arisen before our Party, and on this point I should like to state some considerations. Seventeen years have passed since the last change of cards. The period for which Party cards were issued has run out. It would be correct if we approached the change of Party cards not formally but as an important organisational and political measure. The change should be organised in such a way as to further strengthen the Party and increase the activity and discipline of Communists. It would be also possible to satisfy the wish of many Communists that the Party card should bear the image of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, founder and leader of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
Comrades, the strength of our Party lies in the high ideological level, activity and dedication of the Communists. Today our Party is leading the people in the fulfilment of great creative tasks. Its moral prestige will be the higher, the loftier the ideological and moral qualities of every Communist.
Regrettably, we still have Party members who do not show themselves to be real political fighters. When they come across shortcomings and other negative phenomena they pretend to notice nothing, adopting the position of philistines, who say, "This does not concern me, let others worry about it." There are also some whose activity is for purposes of show, of creating an outward impression. They talk more than others about the need for doing one thing or another, always lecture and exhort everybody. But as soon as the time for practical action comes they manage to remain on the sidelines.
Communists are more and more emphatically condemning this sort of behaviour. The Party cannot accept passivity and indifference. If you are a Communist your duty is not to shirk difficulties, not to encourage backward attitudes, but to be a politically conscious and active fighter of the Party. Always and everywhere---in work, social activities, study and everyday life---a Communist must remain a Communist and worthily bear the lofty title of member of our Leninist Party.
of the Communist Parties of the Union republics and the territorial and regional Party committees accorded these basic Party units constant attention. The work of a number of primary Party organisations functioning at enterprises and establishments in various branches of the national economy and state administration was discussed in the CC CPSU. The decisions adopted on these questions were the result of a study of local experience, of real-life practice. They helped the Party organs and the primary organisations to take present-day requirements more fully into consideration and concentrate on resolving the main tasks. This is all the more important because we still have organisations that work poorly, do not display the needed initiative, and reconcile themselves to shortcomings.
Steps have been taken to improve the structure of the primary organisations. For example, Party committees have been set up in the railway junctions, and integrated Party organisations have been formed in production amalgamations and trusts. By way of an experiment, enlarged Party committees have been elected in some primary organisations that have more than a thousand Communists.
It is necessary to continue enhancing the influence of the primary Party organisations on the work of factories and offices. In this connection the numerous suggestions from Communists and Party committees that the provision in the CPSU Rules on the right to control the activities of the management should be specified merit attention. Here the question is that besides the Party organisations in production this right should be enjoyed by the primary Party organisations at research institutes, educational establishments and cultural and medical institutions. As regards the Party organisations at central and local government and economic institutions and departments, they must control the activity of the apparatus fulfilling the directives of the Party and the Government.
It goes without saying that in exercising control account must be taken of the specifics of the given enterprise or institution. For example, the Party organisations at ministries evidently cannot directly influence the activities of the enterprises and institutions within the jurisdiction of the given ministry. But it is the direct duty of the Party organisation to control the organisation of the work in the ministry itself and the observance of Party and state discipline by its personnel.
The work aimed at improving the structure and activity of local Party organisations continued during the period under review. Nine regional Party committees were formed, chiefly in the Central Asian republics, and 21 town, 38 urban district and 291 rural district committees were set up. The formation of new Party organisations and their leading organs made it possible to intensify the Party's influence in a number of important sectors. Their apparatus
932. STRENGTHENING OF PARTY ORGANISATIONS. SELECTION AND TRAINING OF CADRES
Comrades, in the implementation of the Party's policy, one of the most important places is occupied by the primary Party organisations. In our Party we now have over 370,000 primary organisations, or 45,000 more than on the eve of the 23rd Congress. During the period under review the CC CPSU, the Central Committees
92was formed chiefly from the existing personnel. In this connection I should like to say that whereas during the past 14 years the CPSU membership doubled, increasing from 7 to 14 million, the staff of the Party apparatus was reduced by more than 20 per cent.
At present in the CPSU there are 14 Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union republics, 6 territorial committees, 142 regional committees, 10 area committees, 760 town committees, 448 urban district committees and 2,810 rural district committees. There is every indication for declaring that if always and in everything our Party comes forward as a close-knit, monolithic force, acts confidently in the country and on the international scene and successfully copes with the tasks confronting it, this is due to a very great extent to the fact that the republican, territorial, regional, area, town and district Party organisations steadily implement the Party's policy and are a reliable mainstay of the CC CPSU.
Comrades, during the preparations for this Congress the Communists put forward many suggestions aimed at further strengthening all links of the Party, removing shortcomings in its work and improving inner-Party life. A considerable number of these suggestions must be utilised directly on the spot. Some concern the Party as a whole and should be examined at this Congress. I have mentioned one of them in connection with the question of enhancing the role of primary Party organisations. Permit me now to dwell on another suggestion.
Many comrades feel that regular congresses of the CPSU should be convened not once in four years but once in five years. It seems to us that there are grounds for raising this question. By convening congresses once every five years the CPSU would be in a position to sum up the results and chart the tasks of each five-year period in accordance with our practice of planning economic development.
It is suggested that congresses of the Communist Parties of the Union republics should likewise be convened every five years. As regards territorial, regional, area, town and district Party conferences, they could be held twice in the five-year period between congresses, in other words, once in two or three years. Moreover, it would evidently be expedient to establish the same time span also for election meetings and conferences in primary Party organisations that have their own committees. In all the other primary and shop Party organisations election meetings should be held annually as before.
If these suggestions are approved by the Congress delegates they could be incorporated in the Rules of the CPSU.
Comrades, the raising of the level of leadership bearing on all aspects of social life, and of the organisational and political work among the masses is inseparably linked with an improvement of
94Ihe selection, placing and training of cadres. In this respect our Party now has immense possibilities. There is a higher level of political consciousness, education and professional training of workers, collective farmers and intellectuals. It is from them, from the thick of the people, that the Party promotes talented and able leaders for all sectors of communist construction. Over 80 per cent of the present secretaries of the Central Committees of the Communist Parties of the Union republics, and of the territorial and regional committees, of the chairmen of the Councils of Ministers and of the territorial and regional executive committees, and nearly 70 per cent of the ministers and chairmen of the state committees of the USSR began their careers as workers or peasants. More than half of the directors of the largest industrial enterprises in the country were once workers.
During the period under review many new people have been promoted to Party, government and administrative work in the centre and in the localities, and the cadres have been renewed or reinforced with fresh contingents.
The secretaries of some territorial and regional committees, the chairmen of some regional executive committees and other functionaries from republican, territorial and regional organs have been promoted to posts in central bodies such as ministers, chairmen of state committees and other leading positions. In recent years the CC has also taken steps to send Party and government functionaries to reinforce the cadres working abroad.
Many new comrades with an excellent political and specialist training have been promoted to the leadership of Party and government bodies in the localities, including the posts of first secretaries of the Central Committees of the republican Communist Parties, and of territorial and regional committees. Moreover, the Central Committee has consistently followed the line of promoting local functionaries; people from the centre were appointed to these posts only in exceptional cases. This practice of selecting and placing cadres is receiving the approval and support of Party organisations and all Communists.
The aim of our cadre policy is to promote ypung, promising functionaries while maintaining a considerate attitude to veteran cadres and making the maximum use of their experience and knowledge. This is a mandatory condition of the consistency of Ihe Party political line and of its revolutionary traditions. In the work with cadres the practice today is to combine trust and respect for people with principled exactingness. This produces a businesslike, comradely atmosphere and allows cadres to display their capabilities more fully.
Life is continuously making greater demands on cadres. We need people who combine a high level of political consciousness with a sound professional training, people who can knowledgeably
95tackle the problems of economic and cultural development and are well-versed in modern methods of management.
In cadres the Party has always highly valued a feeling for the new. To have this feeling means to visualise the prospects for development, to look into the future and find the surest ways of resolving problems as they arise. This quality is particularly important today, when swift and far-reaching changes are taking place in social life and production.
The organisation and education of people occupy a prominent place in the work of our leading cadres. Even if a leader is vested with the powers stemming from one-man authority, he cannot depend solely on the force of orders. It is no accident that our Party constantly stresses the need for an organic link between managerial and educational work. It demands that leading cadres should constantly think of the educational effects of the economic and administrative decisions adopted by them.
It sometimes happens that a manager suddenly gets the idea that all the secrets of life are open to him, that he knows everything. That is when he begins issuing instructions on all questions, ordering people about, instead of skilfully using the experience and knowledge of others. We have long had skilled cadres capable of correctly resolving the problems within their competence. We must put more trust in them and, correspondingly, more must be
asked of them.
The combination of collective leadership with personal responsibility for the assigned work is an indispensable condition of the growth and education of cadres, of the correct organisation of our entire work. While promoting the collegial principle in the leadership we must, at the same time, remember that one of the basic principles of management, as formulated by V. I. Lenin and as our Party understands it, is that "a definite person is fully responsible for some specified work" (Collected Works, Vol. 36, p. 529). Wellorganised control of the fulfilment of the directives of the Party and the government plays an important role in enhancing the personal responsibility of cadres.
One of our key tasks is to enhance the discipline and responsibility of cadres. We have in mind discipline founded not on fear, not on methods of ruthless administration which deprive people of confidence and initiative, and engender overcautiousness and dishonesty. What we have in mind is discipline founded on a high level of consciousness and responsibility of people. As regards cadres who violate discipline, fail to draw conclusions from criticism and behave incorrectly, the necessary measures must be taken against them. In our country leading posts are not reserved for anybody forever. Socialist discipline is the same for all members of society; it is mandatory for one and all.
A substantial step towards improving the work with cadres was the creation of a large network of permanently operating
96courses for the training and re-training of Party and government functionaries. During the period under review these courses were finished by nearly 200,000 persons. Refresher institutes, departments and courses have been set up for executives and specialists. An Institute for National Economic Management in which the leading cadres of our industry, including ministers, will improve their knowledge, has recently been opened. In our country the retraining of cadres has never before been conducted on such a scale and it has never involved so many people.
But independent work, naturally, has been and remains the basic method of study. To keep pace with life all our cadres must constantly study, raise their ideological and theoretical level and master the achievements of science and advanced practice.
At all stages of the struggle for the building of the new society our cadres have always been equal to the task and justified the trust placed in them. We are firmly confident that they will continue to implement the Party's policy skilfully and perseveringly and serve the people with dedication.
3. THE PARTY'S IDEOLOGICAL AND THEORETICAL WORK. THE MARXIST-LENINIST EDUCATION OF COMMUNISTS
Comrades, our Party is a party of scientific communism. It is steadfastly guided by Marxist-Leninist science, which is the most advanced, revolutionary science of modern times, and does everything for its further development. Theoretical understanding of the phenomena of social life and of its main trends enables the Party to foresee the course of social processes, work out a correct political line and avoid errors and subjectivistic decisions.
Our Party's and people's multiform experience of revolutionary struggle, the building of socialism and communism, and problems of the world revolutionary process, the specifics of the present stage of international relations, have all found expression in the decisions of Plenary Meetings of the CC and in the Party's documents commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Great October Revolution and the Centenary of the Birth of V. I. Lenin. These documents are the result of the development of the Party's theoretical thinking, the result of the collective work of the Central Committee and our Party and scientific cadres. Considerable theoretical work was accomplished in connection with the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties in 1969, and also in connection with such outstanding events in the life of the international communist movement as the 150th birth anniversaries of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, and the centenary of the Paris Commune.
Fundamental M*orks showing more fully Lenin's role as the leader and theoretician of the greatest revolution, and as the creator
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97of the Parly of the working class and founder of the world's first socialist state have been published during the period under review. As an eternally living and developing teaching, Leninism has been, remains and will be the crux of the Party's ideological life, and the foundation of all its revolutionary, transformative activity. While drawing on Lenin's ideological legacy, the Party holds that its cardinal task is to find solutions to pressing problems of communist construction on the basis of Lenin's ideas and Lenin's methodology.
In many respects the ways of building the material and technical basis of communism have been specified in recent years. The Party's thinking was directed towards elaborating modern methods of planning and management and the ways of increasing the efficiency of the economy and improving material and moral incentives. The elaboration of the basic questions of the Party's agrarian policy at the present stage was of great theoretical importance.
Much attention was given to the further development of the teaching on the leading role of the Communist Party. Everybody knows that this is one of the fundamental questions of the revolutionary movement and the building of the new society. Today it has become the pivot of the struggle between Marxist-Leninists and representatives of various forms of revisionism. The principled stand of the CPSU and its relentless struggle for the purity of the Marxist-Leninist teaching on the Party was of international significance, helping, as is emphasised by the fraternal Parties, the Communists and millions of working people to maintain a correct orientation.
The Party attached immense importance to the accurate, unbiased presentation of the history of our state. Sharp and just criticism was levelled at individual attempts to assess the history of the Soviet people from non-Party, non-class positions, and belittle the significance of their socialist gains. At the same time, the Parly showed the hollowness of dogmatic notions which ignored the great positive changes that have taken place in the life of our society in recent years.
The experience of past years has convincingly shown that the surmounting of the consequences of the personality cult and also of subjectivistic errors has favourably affected the general political and, above all, the ideological situation in the country. We have been and remain true to the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism and shall never make any concessions on questions of ideology.
Together with other governing Communist Parties, the CPSU has continued the elaboration of the fundamental questions of the development of the world socialist system. The study and generalisation of each other's experience have made it possible to specify the characteristics of the general laws of socialist construction and reveal more fully the main features of the socialism that has al-
98ready been built. Particular attention was given to working out the principles of economic integration and other problems arising in the process of co-operation between the fraternal countries and Parties.
A considerable place in the Party's theoretical work was given to analysing the new phenomena in the development of modern capitalism and the ways and means by which \vorld socialism in fluences the development of the non-socialist part of the world, to studying the new processes taking place in capitalist economy, particularly under the impact of the scientific and technical revolution.
Theoretical work is a major element of our common internationalist, revolutionary duty. The struggle between the forces of capitalism and socialism on the world scene and the attempts of revisionists of all hues to emasculate the revolutionary teaching and distort the practice of socialist and communist construction require that we continue to pay undivided attention to the problems and creative development of theory. Repetition of old formulas where they have become outworn and an inability or reluctance to adopt a new approach to new problems harm the cause and create additional possibilities for the spread of revisionist counterfeits of Marxism-Leninism. Criticism of bourgeois and revisionist attacks on our theory and practice becomes much more convincing when it is founded on the active and creative development of the social sciences, of Marxist-Leninist theory.
Quite a lot has thus been accomplished, comrades. However, the Central Committee does not consider that everything in our theoretical work is satisfactory. Many problems have only been outlined and await profound elaboration. The Party will have to devote still more attention to the development of theory, improve the work of scientific institutions and see that the social sciences establish a close tie with the practice of Party and state work, with the implementation of the concrete tasks of communist construction.
The Party considers it very important that Communists should perseveringly master the theory of Marxism-Leninism, know the laws of social development, acquire the ability of confidently getting their bearings in the new phenomena of life, evaluate them correctly and draw correct practical conclusions. The ideological steeling of Communists is an indispensable condition for enhancing the militancy of the Party ranks.
After the 23rd Congress the Party organisations have accomplished a great deal in the way of improving the organisation of Marxist-Leninist education. We have, as you all know, a comprehensive system of Party education consisting of three stages--- primary, middle and higher. This ensures continuity in the study of theory and the history and policy of the Party and enables Party committees to take the training level and interests of Communists
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