The first attempts at collectivization were made by the Soviet government immediately after the revolution. However, at that time there were many more serious problems. The decision to carry out collectivization in the USSR was made at the 15th Party Congress in 1927. The reasons for collectivization were, first of all:
- the need for large investments in industry to industrialize the country;
- and the “grain procurement crisis” that the authorities faced in the late 20s.
The collectivization of peasant farms began in 1929. During this period, taxes on individual farms were significantly increased. The process of dispossession began - deprivation of property and, often, deportation of wealthy peasants. There was a massive slaughter of livestock - the peasants did not want to give it to collective farms. Members of the Politburo who objected to harsh pressure on the peasantry were accused of right-wing deviation.
But, according to Stalin, the process was not going fast enough. In the winter of 1930, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee decided to carry out complete collectivization of agriculture in the USSR as quickly as possible, within 1 - 2 years. Peasants were forced to join collective farms under the threat of dispossession. The seizure of bread from the village led to a terrible famine in 1932-33. which broke out in many regions of the USSR. During that period, according to minimal estimates, 2.5 million people died.
As a result, collectivization dealt a significant blow to agriculture. Grain production decreased, the number of cows and horses decreased by more than 2 times. Only the poorest layers of peasants benefited from mass dispossession and joining collective farms. The situation in rural areas improved somewhat only during the 2nd Five-Year Plan period. Carrying out collectivization became one of the important stages in the approval of the new regime.
Collectivization of agriculture in the USSR- is the unification of small individual peasant farms into large collective ones through production cooperation.
Grain procurement crisis of 1927 - 1928 threatened industrialization plans.
The XV Congress of the All-Union Communist Party proclaimed collectivization as the main task of the party in the countryside. The implementation of the collectivization policy was reflected in the widespread creation of collective farms, which were provided with benefits in the field of credit, taxation, and the supply of agricultural machinery.
Goals of collectivization:
- increasing grain exports to ensure financing of industrialization;
- implementation of socialist transformations in the countryside;
- ensuring supplies to rapidly growing cities.
The pace of collectivization:
- spring 1931 - main grain regions;
- spring 1932 - Central Chernozem region, Ukraine, Ural, Siberia, Kazakhstan;
- end of 1932 - other areas.
During mass collectivization, kulak farms were liquidated - dispossession. Lending was stopped and taxation of private households was increased, laws on land leasing and labor hiring were abolished. It was forbidden to admit kulaks to collective farms.
In the spring of 1930, anti-collective farm protests began. In March 1930, Stalin published the article Dizziness from Success, in which he blamed local authorities for forced collectivization. Most of the peasants left the collective farms. However, already in the fall of 1930, the authorities resumed forced collectivization.
Collectivization was completed by the mid-30s: 1935 on collective farms - 62% of farms, 1937 - 93%.
The consequences of collectivization were extremely severe:
- reduction in gross grain production and livestock numbers;
- growth in bread exports;
- mass famine 1932 - 1933 from which more than 5 million people died;
- weakening of economic incentives for the development of agricultural production;
- alienation of peasants from property and the results of their labor.
The policy of complete collectivization in the USSR: results and consequences
Among the Bolshevik revolutionaries there were few educated intellectuals and experienced business executives, but they were all armed with the “Most Advanced Revolutionary Theory”, which they were very proud of. According to the Theory, weakly controlled owners are contraindicated for the new government. It is necessary to transform the peasants into the rural proletariat. This is precisely the result that the policy of complete collectivization in the USSR should have led to.
And this had to be done against the backdrop of the inevitable post-war and post-revolutionary crisis. The authorities understood that they needed to admit the obvious: unemployment, devastation, hunger. But they demanded that what was happening be interpreted correctly: the party knows, the party will fight and win, and collectivization is only part of the party’s larger policy. For this purpose, the best journalists and writers are involved.
No investments are needed to create collective farms. The village just has to give bread. And she will give it. Money is needed for industry and the army. And to the west, also gripped by a crisis, grain trains are coming...
The trial wave of collectivization in the USSR began in 1927. Exorbitant taxes on individual farmers. The lowest purchasing prices are for them. The authorities are in a hurry. The leader calls for “overcoming centuries-old backwardness in 10 years,” and economic half-measures did not produce immediate results. Coercive measures were required. The bread had to be knocked out. Through thick and thin. Otherwise, the defeat of the party and the death of power. And in 1929, a tsunami of collectivization poured in...
The results of complete collectivization in the USSR
The first result: during the years of collectivization, grain was exported in the amount of 677 million still convertible “gold” rubles. 
Here it is, money for modernization. 9 thousand factories were built, industrial production doubled by 1934. Yes, quantity at the expense of quality. But the main task - to ensure state control over production and consumption - has been solved.
Other tactical results include:
- the crisis has been overcome;
- unemployment was eliminated;
- the advantage of large producers over small ones has been “proven”;
- new industries and the military-industrial complex were created;
- the best, most efficient and active part of the peasantry was destroyed;
- a monstrous mass famine occurred.
Consequences of the policy of complete collectivization
Long term results are:
- the country has become one of the few capable of producing any product;
- production of consumer goods is reduced to a minimum;
- forced labor incentives triumphed over economic ones;
- the command-administrative management system is being absolutized;
- a powerful propaganda apparatus has been created;
- the ruble loses convertibility;
- all sectors of the national economy are provided with cheap labor;
- the Great Empire of state socialism was formed;
- Fear takes hold of the hearts of Soviet people even more powerfully.
History has drawn the main conclusion: the great theory turned out to be wrong. And not only about the policy of complete collectivization. Universal economic laws cannot be neglected. The people cannot be sacrificed to theory: a people who have always shown their colossal potential will win the war in ten years.
Sources: historykratko.com, prezentacii.com, zubolom.ru, rhistory.ucoz.ru, iqwer.ru
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On the 12th anniversary of the October Revolution, Stalin published an article in Pravda, “The Year of the Great Turning Point,” in which he set the task of speeding up collective farm construction and carrying out “complete collectivization.” In 1928-1929, when under conditions of “emergency” the pressure on individual farmers sharply increased, and collective farmers were provided with benefits, the number of collective farms increased 4 times - from 14.8 thousand in 1927 to 70 thousand by the fall of 1929 The middle peasants went to collective farms, hoping to wait out the difficult times there. Collectivization was carried out through the simple addition of peasant means of production. Collective farms of the “manufacturing type” were created, not equipped with modern agricultural machinery. These were mainly TOZs - partnerships for joint cultivation of land, the simplest and temporary form of a collective farm. The November (1929) plenum of the Central Committee of the Party set the main task in the countryside - to carry out complete collectivization in a short time. The plenum planned to send 25 thousand workers (“twenty-five thousand workers”) to the villages “to organize” collective farms. Factory teams that sent their workers to the villages were obliged to take patronage over the created collective farms. To coordinate the work of government institutions created for the purpose of restructuring agriculture (Zernotrest, Kolkhoz Center, Tractor Center, etc.), the plenum decided to create a new Union People's Commissariat - the People's Commissariat of Agriculture, headed by Ya.A. Yakovlev, Marxist agrarian, journalist. Finally, the November plenum of the Central Committee ridiculed the “prophecies” of Bukharin and his supporters (Rykov, Tomsky, Ugarov, etc.) about the inevitable famine in the country, Bukharin, as the “leader and instigator” of the “right deviation”, was removed from the Politburo of the Central Committee, the rest were warned that at the slightest attempt to fight against the line of the Central Committee, “organization measures” will be used against them.
On January 5, 1930, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks adopted a resolution “On collectivization and measures of state assistance to collective farm construction.” It planned to complete the complete collectivization of the grain regions in stages by the end of the five-year plan. In the main grain regions (North Caucasus, Middle and Lower Volga) it was planned to be completed in the fall of 1930, in other grain regions - a year later. The resolution outlined the creation of agricultural artels in areas of complete collectivization “as a transitional form of collective farm to the commune.” At the same time, the inadmissibility of admitting kulaks to collective farms was emphasized. The Central Committee called for organizing socialist competition to create collective farms and resolutely fight “all attempts” to restrain collective farm construction. As in November, the Central Committee did not say a word about observing the principle of voluntariness, encouraging arbitrariness by silence.
At the end of January - beginning of February 1930, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, the Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR adopted two more resolutions and instructions on the liquidation of the kulaks. It was divided into three categories: terrorists, resisters and the rest. Everyone was subject to arrest or exile with confiscation of property. “Dekulakization became an integral part of the collectivization process.
Progress of collectivization
The first stage of complete collectivization, which began in November 1929, lasted until the spring of 1930. The forces of local authorities and the “twenty-five thousanders” began the forced unification of individual farmers into communes. Not only the means of production, but also personal subsidiary plots and property were socialized. The forces of the OGPU and the Red Army evicted “dispossessed” peasants, which included all the dissatisfied. By decision of the secret commissions of the Central Committee and the Council of People's Commissars, they were sent to special settlements of the OGPU to work according to economic plans, mainly in logging, construction, and mining. According to official data, more than 320 thousand households (more than 1.5 million people) were dispossessed; According to modern historians, about 5 million people were dispossessed and exiled throughout the country. The discontent of the peasants resulted in mass slaughter of livestock, flight to the cities, and anti-collective farm uprisings. If in 1929 there were more than a thousand of them, then in January-March 1930 there were more than two thousand. Army units and aviation took part in suppressing the rebellious peasants. The country was on the brink of civil war.
The mass indignation of peasants over forced collectivization forced the country's leadership to temporarily ease the pressure. Moreover, on behalf of the Politburo of the Central Committee, in Pravda on March 2, 1930, Stalin published the article “Dizziness from Success,” in which he condemned the “excesses” and blamed the local authorities and workers sent to create collective farms for them. Following the article, Pravda published a resolution of the Central Committee of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (b) dated March 14, 1930, “On the fight against distortions of the party line in the collective farm movement.” Among the “distortions”, the violation of the principle of voluntariness was put in first place, then the “dekulakization” of the middle peasants and the poor, looting, wholesale collectivization, jumping from the artel to the commune, the closure of churches and markets. After the resolution, the first echelon of local collective farm organizers were subjected to repression. At the same time, many of the created collective farms were dissolved, their number was reduced by approximately half by the summer of 1930, they united a little more than 1/5 of the peasant farms.
However, in the autumn of 1930, a new, more cautious stage of complete collectivization began. From now on, only agricultural artels were created, allowing the existence of personal, subsidiary farms. In the summer of 1931, the Central Committee explained that “complete collectivization” cannot be understood primitively, as “universal”, that its criterion is the involvement of at least 70% of farms in grain farming and more than 50% in other areas into collective farms. By that time, collective farms already united about 13 million peasant households (out of 25 million), i.e. more than 50% of their total number. And in the grain regions, almost 80% of the peasants were on collective farms. In January 1933, the country's leadership announced the eradication of exploitation and the victory of socialism in the countryside as a result of the liquidation of the kulaks.
In 1935, the Second All-Union Congress of Collective Farmers took place. He adopted a new Model Charter of the agricultural artel (instead of the 1930 Charter). According to the Charter, land was assigned to collective farms for “eternal use”; the basic forms of labor organization on collective farms (teams), its accounting and payment (by workdays), and the size of personal subsidiary plots (LPH) were established. The Charter of 1935 legislated new production relations in the countryside, which historians called “early socialist”. With the transition of the collective farm to the new Charter (1935-1936), the collective farm system in the USSR finally took shape.
Results of collectivization
By the end of the 30s. collective farms united more than 90% of peasants. Collective farms were serviced by agricultural machinery, which was concentrated on state machine and tractor stations(MTS).
The creation of collective farms did not, contrary to expectations, lead to an increase in agricultural production. In the 1936-1940s gross agricultural output remained at the level of 1924-1928, i.e. pre-collective farm village. And at the end of the first five-year plan, it turned out to be lower than in 1928. The production of meat and dairy products sharply decreased, and for many years, in the figurative expression of N.S. Khrushchev, “virgin meat land” was formed. At the same time, collective farms made it possible to significantly increase state procurement of agricultural products, especially grain. This led to the abolition of the rationing system in cities in 1935 and the increasing export of bread.
The course towards maximum extraction of agricultural products from the countryside led in 1932-1933. to mortal famine in many agricultural areas of the country. There is no official data on the victims of artificial famine. Modern Russian historians estimate their numbers differently: from 3 to 10 million people.
The mass exodus from the village exacerbated the difficult socio-political situation in the country. To stop this process, as well as to identify fugitive “kulaks” at the turn of 1932-1933. A passport regime with registration in a specific place of residence was introduced. From now on, it was possible to move around the country only if you had a passport or a document officially replacing it. Passports were issued to residents of cities, urban-type settlements, and state farm workers. Collective farmers and individual peasants were not issued passports. This attached them to the land and collective farms. From that time on, it was possible to officially leave the village through state-organized recruitment for five-year construction projects, study, service in the Red Army, and work as machine operators in MTS. The regulated process of forming workers has led to a decrease in the growth rate of the urban population, the number of workers and employees. According to the 1939 census, with a total population of the USSR of 176.6 million people (historians put the figure at 167.3 million), 33% of the population lived in cities (versus 18%, according to the 1926 census).
Collectivization in the USSR
Collectivization- the process of uniting individual peasant farms into collective farms (collective farms in the USSR). It was carried out in the USSR in the late 1920s - early 1930s (1928-1933). (the decision on collectivization was made at the XV Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)), in the western regions of Ukraine, Belarus and Moldova, in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania,
The goal of collectivization is the establishment of socialist production relations in the countryside, the elimination of small-scale commodity production to resolve grain difficulties and provide the country with the necessary amount of marketable grain.
Agriculture in Russia before collectivization
The country's agriculture was disrupted by World War I and the Civil War. According to the All-Russian Agricultural Census of 1917, the working-age male population in the village decreased by 47.4% compared to 1914; the number of horses - the main draft force - from 17.9 million to 12.8 million. The number of livestock and sown areas decreased, and agricultural yields decreased. A food crisis has begun in the country. Even two years after the end of the civil war, grain crops amounted to only 63.9 million hectares (1923).
In the last year of his life, V.I. Lenin called, in particular, for the development of the cooperative movement. It is known that before dictating the article “On Cooperation,” V.I. Lenin ordered literature on cooperation from the library, among others there was book by A. V. Chayanov “Basic ideas and forms of organization of peasant cooperation” (M., 1919). And in the Lenin library in the Kremlin there were seven works by A.V. Chayanov. A. V. Chayanov highly appreciated V. I. Lenin’s article “On Cooperation.” He believed that after this Leninist work, “cooperation is becoming one of the foundations of our economic policy. During the NEP years, cooperation began to be actively restored. According to the memoirs of the former Chairman of the USSR Government A.S. Kosygin (he worked in the leadership of cooperatives until the early 1930s organizations in Siberia), “the main thing that forced him to “leave the ranks of cooperators” was that collectivization, which unfolded in Siberia in the early 30s, meant, paradoxical as it may seem at first glance, disorganization of a largely powerful, a cooperative network covering all corners of Siberia."
The restoration of pre-war grain sown areas - 94.7 million hectares - was achieved only by 1927 (the total sown area in 1927 was 112.4 million hectares against 105 million hectares in 1913). It was also possible to slightly exceed the pre-war level (1913) of productivity: the average yield of grain crops for 1924-1928 reached 7.5 c/ha. It was practically possible to restore the livestock population (with the exception of horses). Gross grain production by the end of the recovery period (1928) reached 733.2 million quintals. The marketability of grain farming remained extremely low - in 1926/27, the average marketability of grain farming was 13.3% (47.2% - collective and state farms, 20.0% - kulaks, 11.2% - poor and middle peasants). In the gross grain production, collective and state farms accounted for 1.7%, kulaks - 13%, middle peasants and poor peasants - 85.3%. The number of private peasant farms by 1926 reached 24.6 million, the average crop area was less than 4.5 hectares (1928), more than 30% of farms did not have the means (tools, draft animals) to cultivate the land. The low level of agricultural technology of small individual farms had no further prospects for growth. In 1928, 9.8% of the sown areas were plowed with a plow, three-quarters of the sowing was done by hand, 44% of grain harvesting was done with a sickle and scythe, and 40.7% of threshing was done by non-mechanical methods (flail, etc.).
As a result of the transfer of landowners' lands to the peasants, peasant farms were fragmented into small plots. By 1928, their number increased one and a half times compared to 1913 - from 16 to 25 million
By 1928-29 The share of poor people in the rural population of the USSR was 35%, middle peasants - 60%, kulaks - 5%. At the same time, it was the kulak farms that had a significant part (15-20%) of the means of production, including about a third of agricultural machines.
"Bread Strike"
The course towards collectivization of agriculture was proclaimed at the XV Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) (December 1927). As of July 1, 1927, there were 14.88 thousand collective farms in the country; for the same period 1928 - 33.2 thousand, 1929 - St. 57 thousand. They united 194.7 thousand, 416.7 thousand and 1,007.7 thousand individual farms, respectively. Among the organizational forms of collective farms, partnerships for joint cultivation of land (TOZs) predominated; There were also agricultural cooperatives and communes. To support collective farms, the state provided various incentive measures - interest-free loans, the supply of agricultural machinery and implements, and the provision of tax benefits.
Complete collectivization
The transition to complete collectivization was carried out against the backdrop of an armed conflict on the Chinese Eastern Railway and the outbreak of the global economic crisis, which caused serious concerns among the party leadership about the possibility of a new military intervention against the USSR.
At the same time, some positive examples of collective farming, as well as successes in the development of consumer and agricultural cooperation, led to a not entirely adequate assessment of the current situation in agriculture.
Since the spring of 1929, events aimed at increasing the number of collective farms were carried out in the countryside - in particular, Komsomol campaigns “for collectivization.” In the RSFSR, the institute of agricultural commissioners was created; in Ukraine, much attention was paid to those preserved from the civil war to the komnesams(analogous to the Russian commander). Mainly through the use of administrative measures, it was possible to achieve a significant increase in collective farms (mainly in the form of TOZs).
In the countryside, forced grain procurements, accompanied by mass arrests and destruction of farms, led to riots, the number of which by the end of 1929 numbered in the hundreds. Not wanting to give property and livestock to collective farms and fearing the repression that wealthy peasants were subjected to, people slaughtered livestock and reduced crops.
Meanwhile, the November (1929) plenum of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks adopted a resolution “On the results and further tasks of collective farm construction,” in which it noted that the country had begun a large-scale socialist reorganization of the countryside and the construction of large-scale socialist agriculture. The resolution indicated the need for a transition to complete collectivization in certain regions. At the plenum, it was decided to send 25 thousand urban workers (twenty-five thousand people) to collective farms for permanent work to “manage the established collective and state farms” (in fact, their number subsequently almost tripled, amounting to over 73 thousand).
This caused sharp resistance from the peasantry. According to data from various sources cited by O. V. Khlevnyuk, in January 1930, 346 mass protests were registered, in which 125 thousand people took part, in February - 736 (220 thousand), in the first two weeks of March - 595 ( about 230 thousand), not counting Ukraine, where 500 settlements were affected by unrest. In March 1930, in general, in Belarus, the Central Black Earth Region, in the Lower and Middle Volga region, in the North Caucasus, in Siberia, in the Urals, in the Leningrad, Moscow, Western, Ivanovo-Voznesensk regions, in the Crimea and Central Asia, 1642 mass peasant uprisings, in which at least 750-800 thousand people took part. In Ukraine at this time, more than a thousand settlements were already engulfed in unrest.
The severe drought that struck the country in 1931 and mismanagement of the harvest led to a significant decrease in the gross grain harvest (694.8 million quintals in 1931 versus 835.4 million quintals in 1930).
Famine in the USSR (1932-1933)
Despite this, local efforts were made to fulfill and exceed the planned norms for the collection of agricultural products - the same applied to the plan for grain exports, despite a significant drop in prices on the world market. This, like a number of other factors, ultimately led to a difficult food situation and famine in villages and small towns in the east of the country in the winter of 1931-1932. The freezing of winter crops in 1932 and the fact that a significant number of collective farms approached the sowing campaign of 1932 without seed and draft animals (which died or were unsuitable for work due to poor care and lack of feed, which were paid towards the general grain procurement plan ), led to a significant deterioration in the prospects for the 1932 harvest. Across the country, plans for export deliveries (about three times), planned grain procurements (by 22%) and livestock delivery (by 2 times) were reduced, but this did not save the general situation - repeated crop failure (death of winter crops, lack of sowing, partial drought, a decrease in yield caused by a violation of basic agronomic principles, large losses during harvesting and a number of other reasons) led to severe famine in the winter of 1932 - spring of 1933.
Collective farm construction in the vast majority of German villages in the Siberian region was carried out as a result of administrative pressure, without sufficient consideration of the degree of organizational and political preparation for it. Dispossession measures were used in many cases as a measure of influence against middle peasants who did not want to join collective farms. Thus, measures aimed exclusively against kulaks affected a significant number of middle peasants in German villages. These methods not only did not contribute, but repelled the German peasantry from collective farms. It is enough to point out that of the total number of kulaks expelled administratively in the Omsk District, half were returned by the OGPU authorities from assembly points and from the road.
Management of the resettlement (timing, number and selection of resettlement sites) was carried out by the Sector of Land Funds and Resettlement of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture of the USSR (1930-1933), the Resettlement Directorate of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture of the USSR (1930-1931), the Sector of Land Funds and Resettlement of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture of the USSR (Reorganized) (1931-1933) , ensured the resettlement of the OGPU.
The deportees, in violation of existing instructions, were provided with little or no necessary food and equipment in the new places of resettlement (especially in the first years of mass expulsion), which often had no prospects for agricultural use.
Export of grain and import of agricultural equipment during collectivization
Import of agricultural machinery and equipment 1926/27 - 1929/30
Since the late 80s, the history of collectivization has included the opinion of some Western historians that “Stalin organized collectivization to obtain money for industrialization through the extensive export of agricultural products (mainly grain).” Statistics do not allow us to be so confident in this opinion:
- Import of agricultural machinery and tractors (thousands of red rubles): 1926/27 - 25,971, 1927/28 - 23,033, 1928/29 - 45,595, 1929/30 - 113,443, 1931 - 97,534 1932-420.
- Export of grain products (million rubles): 1926/27 - 202.6 1927/28 - 32.8, 1928/29 - 15.9 1930-207.1 1931-157.6 1932 - 56.8.
In total, for the period 1926 - 33 grains were exported for 672.8 million rubles and equipment was imported for 306 million rubles.
USSR exports of basic goods 1926/27 - 1933
In addition, during the period 1927-32, the state imported breeding cattle worth about 100 million rubles. Imports of fertilizers and equipment intended for the production of tools and mechanisms for agriculture were also very significant.
USSR imports of basic goods 1929-1933
Results of collectivization
Despite significant efforts to eliminate the “breakthrough in livestock farming” that had formed by 1933-1934, the number of livestock of all categories had not been restored by the beginning of the war. It reached the quantitative indicators of 1928 only at the beginning of the 1960s.
Despite the importance of agriculture, industry remained the main development priority. In this regard, the management and regulatory problems of the early 1930s were not completely eliminated, the main ones being the low motivation of collective farmers and the lack of competent leadership in agriculture at all levels. The residual principle of distribution of leadership resources (when the best managers were sent to industry) and the lack of accurate and objective information about the state of affairs also had a negative impact on agriculture.
December 1928 - 1933
The process of uniting individual peasant farms into collective farms. The goal of collectivization is the establishment of socialist production relations in the countryside, the elimination of small-scale commodity production to resolve grain difficulties and provide the country with the necessary amount of marketable grain. It gave rise to mass famine in the early 30s.
REASONS AND PREREQUISITES
Collectivization had at least four goals. The first, officially proclaimed by the party leadership, is the implementation of socialist transformations in the countryside. The heterogeneity and diversity of the economy was perceived as a contradiction that needed to be overcome. In the future, it was planned to create a large socialist agricultural production that would reliably provide the state with bread, meat and raw materials. Cooperation was considered a way of transition to socialism in the countryside. By 1927, various forms of cooperation covered over a third of peasant farms.
The second goal is to ensure uninterrupted supply to cities that are rapidly growing during industrialization. The main features of industrialization were projected onto collectivization. The frantic pace of industrial growth and urbanization required a sharp increase in food supplies to the city in an extremely short time.
The third goal is to free up workers from the countryside for construction projects of the first five-year plans. Collective farms were large grain producers. The introduction of technology into them was supposed to free millions of peasants from hard manual labor. They were now waiting for work in factories and factories.
The fourth goal is also related to industrialization - increasing the sale of grain for export with the help of collective farm production. The proceeds from this sale were to be used to purchase machinery and equipment for Soviet factories. At that time, the state virtually did not have any other source of foreign currency.
In 1927, another “bread crisis” broke out in the country. Due to the lack of industrial goods for exchange for grain, as well as crop failure in a number of areas, the amount of commercial grain entering the market, as well as the sale of agricultural products to the state, decreased. Industry did not keep up with feeding the city through trade. Fearing a repetition of grain crises and disruption of the industrialization plan, the country's leadership decided to speed up the implementation of complete collectivization. The opinion of agricultural economists (A.V. Chayanov, N.D. Kondratyev and others) that the most promising for the economy is the combination of individual-family, collective and state forms of organization of production was ignored.
In December 1927, the XV Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) adopted a special resolution on the issue of work in the countryside, in which it proclaimed the “Course towards collectivization.” The tasks were set: 1) to create “grain and meat factories”; 2) provide conditions for the use of machines, fertilizers, and the latest agro- and zootechnical production methods; 3) free up labor for industrialization construction projects; 4) eliminate the division of peasants into the poor, middle peasants and kulaks. The “Law on the General Principles of Land Use and Land Management” was issued, according to which significant sums were allocated from the state budget to finance collective farms. To provide technical services to peasant cooperatives, machine and tractor stations (MTS) were organized in rural areas. Collective farms were open to everyone.
Collective farms (kolkhozes) were governed by a general meeting and a board elected by it, headed by a chairman. There were three types of collective farms: 1) partnership for joint cultivation of land (TOZ), where only complex machines were socialized, and the main means of production (land, equipment, working and productive livestock) were in private use; 2) an artel, where land, equipment, working and productive livestock were socialized, and vegetable gardens, small livestock and poultry, and hand tools remained in personal ownership; 3) communes, where everything was common, sometimes to the point of organizing public catering. It was assumed that the peasant himself would be convinced of the advantages of socialization, and there was no rush to take administrative measures.
Having set a course for industrialization, the Soviet leadership was faced with the problem of a shortage of funds and labor for industry. Both could be obtained, first of all, from the agricultural sector of the economy, where by the end of the 20s. 80% of the country's population was concentrated. A solution was found in the creation of collective farms. The practice of socialist construction dictated fast, tough paces and methods.
"YEAR OF THE GREAT TURN"
The transition to collectivization policies began in the summer of 1929, shortly after the adoption of the first five-year plan. The main reason for its accelerated pace was that the state was unable to transfer funds from the countryside to industry by setting low prices for agricultural products. The peasants refused to sell their products on unfavorable terms. In addition, small, technically poorly equipped peasant farms were unable to provide the growing urban population and army with food, or the developing industry with raw materials.
In November 1929, the article “The Year of the Great Turnaround” was published. It spoke of “a radical change in the development of our agriculture from small and backward individual farming to large and advanced collective farming.”
In the spirit of this article, in January 1930, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks adopted a resolution “On the pace of collectivization and measures of state assistance to collective farm construction.” It outlined strict deadlines for its implementation. Two zones were distinguished: the first - the North Caucasus region, the Middle and Lower Volga region, in which collectivization was scheduled to be completed in the fall of 1930-spring of 1931; the second - all other grain-growing regions - by the autumn of 1931 to the spring of 1932. By the end of the first five-year plan, collectivization was planned to be carried out on a nationwide scale.
To carry out collectivization, 25 thousand workers from the cities were mobilized, ready to carry out party directives. Avoidance of collectivization began to be treated as a crime. Under the threat of closing markets and churches, peasants were forced to join collective farms. The property of those who dared to resist collectivization was confiscated. By the end of February 1930, there were already 14 million farms on collective farms - 60% of the total number
Winter 1929-1930 In many villages and hamlets a terrible picture was observed. The peasants drove all their livestock to the collective farm yard (often just a barn surrounded by a fence): cows, sheep, and even chickens and geese. Local collective farm leaders understood the party's decisions in their own way - if socialized, then everything, right down to the birds. Who, how and with what funds would feed the cattle in the winter was not foreseen in advance. Naturally, most of the animals died within a few days. More sophisticated peasants slaughtered their livestock in advance, not wanting to give it to the collective farm. Thus, livestock farming was dealt a huge blow. In fact, at first there was nothing to take from collective farms. The city began to experience an even greater food shortage than before.
DISKULAKIZATION
The shortage of food led to an increase in non-economic coercion in the agricultural sector - the further, the more they did not buy from the peasants, but took them, which led to an even greater reduction in production. First of all, the wealthy peasants, called kulaks, did not want to hand over their grain, livestock, and equipment. Many of them openly opposed local authorities and village activists. In response, local authorities are moving towards dispossession, which since 1930 has been elevated to the rank of state policy. Renting land and using hired labor were prohibited. Determining who was a “kulak” and who was a “middle peasant” was done directly on the ground. There was no single and precise classification. In some areas, those who had two cows, or two horses, or a good house were considered kulaks. Therefore, each district received its own rate of dispossession. In February 1930, a decree was issued defining its procedure. The kulaks were divided into three categories: the first (“counter-revolutionary activist”) - were subject to arrest and could be sentenced to death; the second (active opponents of collectivization) - eviction to remote areas; the third - resettlement within the region. The artificial division into groups and the uncertainty of their characteristics created the ground for arbitrariness on the ground. The compilation of lists of families subject to dispossession was carried out by local OGPU bodies and local authorities with the participation of village activists. The resolution determined that the number of dispossessed people in the region should not exceed 3-5% of all peasant farms.
The country was increasingly covered with a network of camps and settlements of “special settlers” (exiled “kulaks” and members of their families). By January 1932, 1.4 million people were evicted, several hundred thousand of them to remote areas of the country. They were sent to forced labor (for example, for the construction of the White Sea-Baltic Canal), logging in the Urals, Karelia, Siberia, and the Far East. Many died on the way, many died upon arrival at the place, since, as a rule, “special settlers” were planted in an empty place: in the forest, in the mountains, in the steppe. Evicted families were allowed to take with them clothing, bedding and kitchen utensils, and food for 3 months, but the total luggage should not weigh more than 30 pounds (480 kg). The rest of the property was confiscated and distributed between the collective farm and the poor. Families of Red Army soldiers and command staff of the Red Army were not subject to eviction and confiscation of property. Dekulakization became a tool for forcing collectivization: those who resisted the creation of collective farms could legally be repressed as kulaks or their sympathizers - “podkulakniks”.
FROM LETTERS TO THE CHAIRMAN OF THE VTsIK M.I. KALININ. EARLY 1930s
“Dear Comrade Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin! I am reporting from the Makarihi camp - Kotlas. ...Have you noticed that defenseless children from 2 weeks and older are moving along with their parents and are suffering in barracks that are completely unsuitable... Bread is issued with a delay of 5 days. Such a meager ration, and even untimely... All of us, innocent ones, are waiting for the final consideration of the case on our applications...”
“To the Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, Comrade. M.I. Kalinin. While in exile, I saw enough of the horror of this mass eviction of entire families... Even if they were kulaks, although many of them had a completely insignificant, below-average condition, let them be harmful elements, although, to tell the truth, many got here only because of evil languages of their neighbors, but still these are people, not cattle, and they have to live much worse than livestock living with a cultured owner...”
"DIZZY FROM SUCCESS"
Forced collectivization and dispossession caused protest from the peasants. In February-March 1930, mass slaughter of livestock began, and the number of cattle was reduced by a third as a result. In 1929, 1,300 peasant anti-collective farm protests were registered. In the northern Caucasus and in a number of regions of Ukraine, regular units of the Red Army were sent to pacify the peasants. Discontent was also creeping into the army, which was largely composed of peasant children. At the same time, in the villages there were numerous cases of murder of “twenty-five thousanders” - worker activists sent from the city to organize collective farms. Kulaks repeatedly broke and damaged collective farm machines during spring sowing and wrote threatening messages to farm chairmen.
On March 2, 1930, Stalin’s article “Dizziness from Success” was published in Pravda, which contained an accusation of excesses against the local leadership. A resolution was adopted to fight against “distortion of the party line in the collective farm movement.” Some local leaders were punished in a significant manner. At the same time, in March, the Model Charter of the Agricultural Artel was adopted. It proclaimed the principle of voluntary entry into a collective farm, determined the procedure for unification, and the volume of social means of production.
From the article by I.V. Stalin “Dizziness from success,” March 2, 1930: “...Collective farms cannot be planted by force. That would be stupid and reactionary. The collective farm movement must rely on active support from the bulk of the peasantry. It is impossible to mechanically transplant samples of collective farm construction in developed areas to undeveloped areas. That would be stupid and reactionary. Such a “policy” would debunk the policy of collectivization in one blow... To tease the peasant collective farmer with the “socialization” of residential buildings, all dairy cattle, all small livestock, poultry, when the grain problem has not yet been resolved, when the artel form of collective farms has not yet been consolidated - Isn’t it clear that such a “policy” can only be pleasing and beneficial to our sworn enemies? In order to straighten the line of our work in the field of collective farm construction, we must put an end to these sentiments...”
HUNGER 1932-33.
In the early 1930s, grain prices on the world market fell sharply. Harvests 1931 and 1932 in the USSR were below average. However, the sale of bread abroad in order to obtain foreign currency for the purchase of industrial equipment continued. The cessation of exports threatened to disrupt the industrialization program. In 1930, 835 million centners of grain were collected, of which 48.4 million centners were exported. In 1931, accordingly, 695 were collected and 51.8 million centners were exported.
In 1932, the collective farms of the grain districts were unable to fulfill the assignment of delivering grain. Emergency commissions were sent there. The village was overwhelmed by a wave of administrative terror. The removal of millions of centners of grain from collective farms every year for the needs of industrialization soon caused a terrible famine. Often, even the grain that was intended for spring sowing was confiscated. They sowed little and harvested little. But the supply plan had to be fulfilled. Then the last food products were taken from the collective farmers. Imported machines cost the people a very high price, the famine of 1932-1933. Famine broke out in Ukraine, the North Caucasus, Kazakhstan, and Central Russia. Moreover, many starving areas were precisely the country's grain granaries. According to some historians, the famine claimed the lives of more than 5 million people.
RESULTS
After the publication of Stalin’s article “Dizziness from Success,” there was a massive exodus of peasants from collective farms. But soon they enter them again. Agricultural tax rates for individual farmers were increased by 50% compared to collective farms, which did not allow for normal individual farming. In September 1931, collectivization coverage reached 60%. In 1934 - 75%. The entire policy of the Soviet leadership regarding agriculture was aimed at keeping the peasant within strict limits: either work on a collective farm, or go to the city and join the new proletariat. To prevent population migration uncontrolled by the authorities, passports and a registration system were introduced in December 1932. The peasants did not receive passports. Without them, it was impossible to move to the city and get a job there. It was possible to leave the collective farm only with the permission of the chairman. This situation continued until the 1960s. But at the same time, the so-called organized recruitment of labor from the villages to the construction sites of the first five-year plans took place on a massive scale.
Over time, peasant discontent with collectivization subsided. The poor, by and large, had nothing to lose. The middle peasants were getting used to the new situation and did not dare to openly oppose the authorities. In addition, the collective farm system, breaking one of the principles of peasant life - individual farming, continued other traditions - the communal spirit of the Russian village, interdependence and joint work. The new life did not provide a direct incentive for economic initiative. A good chairman could provide an acceptable standard of living on a collective farm, while a careless one could bring it to poverty. But gradually the farms got back on their feet and began to provide the food that the state demanded from them. Collective farmers worked for the so-called “workdays” - a mark for going to work. For their “workdays,” they also received a portion of the collective farm’s output. At first you simply couldn’t dream of prosperity and good income. The resistance of the kulaks, whom some called “world-eaters”, others called enterprising owners, was broken by repressions and taxes. However, many of them remained harbored anger and resentment towards the Soviet system. All this had an impact already during the Great Patriotic War in the manifestation of cooperation with the enemy by some of the repressed kulaks.
In 1934, the final stage of collectivization was announced. The division of the peasants into the poor, middle peasants and kulaks was done away with. By 1937, 93% of peasant farms were united into collective and state farms. State land was assigned to collective farms for eternal use. Collective farms had land and labor. The cars were provided by state machine and tractor stations (MTS). For their work, the MTS received a portion of the harvest. Collective farms were responsible for handing over 25-33% of production to the state at a “fixed price”.
Formally, the management of the collective farm was carried out on the basis of self-government: the general meeting of collective farmers elected a chairman, a board and an audit commission. In fact, the collective farms were managed by the district party committees.
Collectivization solved the problem of free transfer of funds from the agricultural sector to industry, ensured the supply of the army and industrial centers with agricultural products, and also solved the problem of export supplies of bread and raw materials. During the first five-year plan, 40% of export earnings came from grain exports. Instead of 500 - 600 million poods of marketable grain, which was procured earlier, in the mid-1930s the country procured 1200 - 1400 million poods of marketable grain annually. The collective farms, although not well fed, still fed the growing population of the state, especially the cities. The organization of large farms and the introduction of machinery into them made it possible to remove a gigantic number of people from agriculture who worked on industrialization construction sites, then fought against Nazism and again raised industry in the post-war years. In other words, a huge part of the village's human and material resources was released.
The main result of collectivization was an industrial leap, carried out at many unjustified costs, but still achieved.
FROM THE MEMOIRS OF W. CHURCHILL
About a conversation with I. Stalin at negotiations in Moscow in August 1942 (the conversation turned to collectivization in the USSR in the 1930s)
(...) This topic immediately revived Marshal [Stalin].
“Well, no,” he said, “the policy of collectivization was a terrible struggle.”
“I thought that you considered it difficult,” I [Churchill] said, “after all, you were not dealing with several tens of thousands of aristocrats or large landowners, but with millions of little people.”
“With ten million,” he said, raising his hands. - It was something terrible, it lasted four years, but in order to get rid of periodic hunger strikes, Russia absolutely needed to plow the land with tractors. We must mechanize our agriculture. When we gave tractors to peasants, they became unusable after a few months. Only collective farms with workshops can operate tractors. We tried our best to explain this to the peasants...
[the conversation turned to wealthy peasants and Churchill asked]: “Were these the people you called kulaks?”
“Yes,” he replied, without repeating the word. After a pause, he remarked: “It was all very bad and difficult, but necessary.”
“What happened?” - I asked.
“Many of them agreed to come with us,” he replied. “Some of them were given land for individual cultivation in the Tomsk region, or in the Irkutsk region, or even further north, but the bulk of them were very unpopular, and they were destroyed by their farm laborers.”
There was a rather long pause. Stalin then continued: “We have not only enormously increased the food supply, but also immeasurably improved the quality of grain. In the past, all sorts of grains were grown. Now in our entire country no one is allowed to sow any other varieties other than standard Soviet grain. Otherwise they are treated harshly. This means an even greater increase in food supply.”
I... remember how strongly the message made upon me at that time that millions of men and women were being destroyed or permanently displaced. Undoubtedly, a generation will be born that will not know their suffering, but it will, of course, have more food and will bless the name of Stalin...
40. Collectivization in the USSR: reasons, methods of implementation, results.
The collectivization of agriculture in the USSR is the unification of small individual peasant farms into large collective farms through production cooperation.
Grain procurement crisis of 1927 - 1928 (peasants handed over 8 times less grain to the state than in the previous year) jeopardized industrialization plans.
The XV Congress of the CPSU (b) (1927) proclaimed collectivization as the main task of the party in the countryside. The implementation of the collectivization policy was reflected in the widespread creation of collective farms, which were provided with benefits in the field of credit, taxation, and the supply of agricultural machinery.
Goals of collectivization:
increasing grain exports to provide financing for industrialization;
implementation of socialist transformations in the countryside;
ensuring supplies to rapidly growing cities.
The pace of collectivization:
spring 1931 - main grain regions (Middle and Lower Volga region, Northern Caucasus);
spring 1932 - Central Chernozem region, Ukraine, Ural, Siberia, Kazakhstan;
end of 1932 - remaining areas.
During mass collectivization, kulak farms were liquidated - dispossession. Lending was stopped and taxation of private households was increased, laws on land leasing and labor hiring were abolished. It was forbidden to admit kulaks to collective farms.
In the spring of 1930, anti-collective farm protests began (more than 2 thousand). In March 1930, Stalin published the article “Dizziness from Success,” in which he blamed local authorities for forced collectivization. Most of the peasants left the collective farms. However, already in the fall of 1930, the authorities resumed forced collectivization.
Collectivization was completed by the mid-30s: 1935 on collective farms - 62% of farms, 1937 - 93%.
The consequences of collectivization were extremely severe:
reduction in gross grain production and livestock numbers;
growth in bread exports;
mass famine of 1932 - 1933, from which over 5 million people died;
weakening of economic incentives for the development of agricultural production;
alienation of peasants from property and the results of their labor.
41. USSR in the late 30s; internal development,
FOREIGN POLICY.
The internal political and economic development of the USSR at the end of the 30s remained complex and contradictory. This was explained by the strengthening of the personality cult of J.V. Stalin, the omnipotence of the party leadership, and the further strengthening of the centralization of management. At the same time, the people's faith in the ideals of socialism, labor enthusiasm and high citizenship grew.
The economic development of the USSR was determined by the tasks of the third five-year plan (1938 - 1942). Despite the successes (in 1937, the USSR took second place in the world in terms of production), the industrial lag behind the West was not overcome, especially in the development of new technologies and in the production of consumer goods. The main efforts in the 3rd Five-Year Plan were aimed at developing industries that ensure the country's defense capability. In the Urals, Siberia, and Central Asia, the fuel and energy base was developing at an accelerated pace. “Double factories” were created in the Urals, Western Siberia, and Central Asia.
In agriculture, the tasks of strengthening the country's defense capability were also taken into account. Plantings of industrial crops (cotton) expanded. By the beginning of 1941, significant food reserves had been created.
Particular attention was paid to the construction of defense factories. However, the creation of modern types of weapons for that time was delayed. New aircraft designs: the Yak-1, Mig-3 fighters, and the Il-2 attack aircraft were developed during the 3rd Five-Year Plan, but they were not able to establish widespread production before the war. The industry also had not mastered the mass production of T-34 and KV tanks by the beginning of the war.
Major events were carried out in the field of military development. The transition to a personnel system for recruiting the army has been completed. The law on universal conscription (1939) made it possible to increase the size of the army to 5 million people by 1941. In 1940, the ranks of general and admiral were established, and complete unity of command was introduced.
Social events were also driven by defense needs. In 1940, a program for the development of state labor reserves was adopted and the transition to an 8-hour working day and a 7-day working week was implemented. A law was passed on judicial liability for unauthorized dismissal, absenteeism and lateness to work.
At the end of the 1930s, international tensions increased. The Western powers pursued a policy of concessions to Nazi Germany, trying to direct its aggression against the USSR. The culmination of this policy was the Munich Agreement (September 1938) between Germany, Italy, England and France, which formalized the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia.
In the Far East, Japan, having captured most of China, approached the borders of the USSR. In the summer of 1938, an armed conflict occurred on the territory of the USSR in the area of Lake Khasan. The Japanese group was repulsed. In May 1938, Japanese troops invaded Mongolia. Units of the Red Army under the command of G.K. Zhukov defeated them in the area of the Khalkhin Gol River.
At the beginning of 1939, the last attempt was made to create a system of collective security between England, France and the USSR. The Western powers delayed negotiations. Therefore, the Soviet leadership moved towards rapprochement with Germany. On August 23, 1939, a Soviet-German non-aggression pact for a period of 10 years (Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact) was concluded in Moscow. Attached to it was a secret protocol on the delimitation of spheres of influence in Eastern Europe. The interests of the USSR were recognized by Germany in the Baltic states and Bessarabia.
On September 1, Germany attacked Poland. Under these conditions, the leadership of the USSR began to implement the Soviet-German agreements of August 1939. On September 17, the Red Army entered Western Belarus and Western Ukraine. In 1940, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania became part of the USSR.
In November 1939, the USSR started a war with Finland in the hope of its quick defeat, with the goal of moving the Soviet-Finnish border away from Leningrad in the Karelian Isthmus region. At the cost of enormous efforts, the resistance of the Finnish armed forces was broken. In March 1940, a Soviet-Finnish peace treaty was signed, according to which the USSR received the entire Karelian Isthmus.
In the summer of 1940, as a result of political pressure, Romania ceded Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina to the USSR.
As a result, large territories with a population of 14 million people were included in the USSR. Foreign policy agreements of 1939 delayed the attack on the USSR for almost 2 years.
