p It was Lenin who substantiated the possibility of the formerly backward countries moving directly into socialism, either bypassing the capitalist stage altogether, or skipping only the stage of industrialised capitalism. He linked this possibility with the rise and development of socialism in other, more advanced countries, whose proletariat is called upon to provide every assistance to people lagging behind in economic and political development. “With the aid of the proletariat of the advanced countries, backward countries can go over to the Soviet system and, through certain stages of development, to communism, without having to pass through the capitalist stage.”  [344•* 

p This premise is an application of Marxist theory of the socialist revolution to the specific conditions of countries that have not yet attained the capitalist stage of 345 development and is an expression of all that is specific in the conditions and forms of the transition of these countries to socialism.

p Reality has confirmed Lenin’s propositions that backward countries could develop along the non-capitalist road. Of the 65 million non-Russians inhabiting Russia in 1917, 25 million lived in the colonial outskirts of Central Asia and were at one or other pre-capitalist stage of development, retaining not only feudal or semi-patriarchal modes of production, but also tribal system. Thanks to the help of the fraternal nations, the Russians in the first place, these outlying areas in a mere half a century turned into flowering socialist republics with highly developed industry, agriculture and culture. Metallurgical, car manufacturing, electrical engineering and other new, modern industries have been built up there. Agriculture also changed and is now collective and highly mechanised. Cultural backwardness was overcome, and these republics now have their own highlytrained national specialists. As regards cultural development, the Soviet Republics not only outpaced the Eastern capitalist countries, but some of the industrialised capitalist countries in the West as well.

p The once semi-colonial Mongolia has also traversed the path from feudal backwardness to socialism. It has set itself the aim of turning into an advanced industrial-agrarian state in the nearest future with the assistance of the USSR and other socialist countries.

p The experience of the Central Asian Soviet Republics and Mongolia vividly demonstrates what a once backward nation delivered from colonial oppression and exploitation could attain with the help of fraternal peoples. Today it shows the newly-free Asian, African and Latin American peoples how to avoid the terrible phase of capitalist development. It teaches them that the road to real independence and progress is non-capitalist development.

What is then non-capitalist development—the path of socialist orientation?