The Five year plans under Stalin 1928-41

Stalin’s policy for reaching socialism

Trotsky and many others believed the revolution would fall quickly if not joined by other countries. As this had not happened the party gravitated towards the policy of ‘Socialism in one country’ as it made them appear more special and focused on the growing policy of nationalism. The country had caught up to 1913 level of industry, but still had a long way to go to reach other countries levels of industrialisation.

Gosplan

The state planning authority. Took control of all industry and brought small business owners into state owned cooperatives and placed party officials in factories to monitor the speed that targets were being achieved.

Implementation of the five year plans

Announced at the 15th party congress the removal of bourgeois experts began very soon after. These were the individuals that had been allowed to remain in their position until ideologically sound replacements could be found. Many were put through show trials. Factory managers lost their autonomy instead working under a party official to meet the state targets.

The First Five Year Plan 1928-32

Focused almost entirely on the growth of heavy industry recommended by the ‘super industrialisers’ with steel, iron and coal at the heart of the priorities as they would allow for public works projects to be undertaken

The Second Five Year Plan (1933-37)

This initially set goals including heavy industry and consumer goods, but the impending threat of invasion from Nazi Germany meant a huge focus was still on heavy industry

Third five year plan 1938-1941

This focused almost entirely on the defence industry before being cut short by the Nazi invasion. Factories continued to work during the war but not using a set framework in the same way.

Magnitogorsk

As mining practice advanced deposits of raw material were identified. In this area before the first five year plan 25 people had lived, after it 250,000 lived here focused on the extraction raw materials. the work was hard and the reward was minimal. Due to the speed of expansion most workers lived in tents or barracks.

Alexei Stakhanov and the Stakhanovites

As so many of the workers were unskilled teams of well trained workers called shock brigades would be brought into a factory or mine whenever productivity slowed to boost it back up. Stakhanov was a propaganda mascot who was meant to have achieved superhuman feats of productivity but it isn’t known if he did this nor if he was a real person. Councils of Stakhanovite workers would be set up to inspire the masses.

Gulag - Chief administration of corrective labour camps

These forced labour camps is where the rich, foreign, counter-revolutionary, and, by the late 30’s, effectively anyone could be found. They would operate in the outreaches of the union where free men would never work and became a meat grinder due to exposure, exhaustion, and disease.

White sea canal project 1931-32

Being managed by Naftaly Frenkel it was operating in a system that maximised deaths. There was barely any machinery or equipment instead using 180,000 prisoners to dig the canal by hand. To get it done on budget and on time (both of which were far too low to fit with propaganda) it was only deep enough to accommodate small barges and was largely pointless. 10,000 prisoners died on this project.

Naftaly Frenkel

A Palestinian businessman imprisioned at Solovki gulag for smuggling contraband into the Union he was shocked the prisons inefficiency and put a suggestion into the suggestion box which was somehow read by Yagoda. He was taken to Moscow and explained rations should be allocated only if quotas were met and rations should be based on physical abilities. He was released in 1927 and quickly had Solovki operating as a profitable system. He was then put in charge of the White sea canal project.

Motivation the people had to work

Revolutionary spirit was still alive by this point. Those who volunteered to work on grand projects were often disappointed by just how horrendous it was but continued fuelled by propaganda such as the many Lenin statues that lined the streets.

Changes between the first and Second + third plans

These plans aimed to avoid the manic chaos of the first plan and expanded the development all over the Soviet Union in part to protect industry from a western invasion. It is clear these two plans did have a significant impact on industry and infrastructure, but led to a decline in consumer goods and housing which would plague the Soviet Union for the rest of it’s existence. There was a significant increase in footwear and food production meaning new bakeries and ice creams became available.

The Dnieper damn project

This was part of the effort Lenin and Stalin had supported to bring the Soviet Union out of the dark ages. This was done using machinery recently developed and did create a hugely successful hydropower station.

Failures of the second and third plan

The overriding issue was the lack of consumer goods. There was also failures in the oil industry as production fell 18.1 million tons short of the predicted number. These numbers were massively overestimated set by the rigid Moscow government who gave no leeway to areas with local issues. This led to the same problems of the first five year plan where bribery and theft of resources from other factories had to be used to keep on target.

Impact of this policy

By 1945 the USSR had proved itself to be one of the big players on the world stage having defeated the greatest military threat they had ever faced without collapsing. It is undoubtable that economic growth was huge in spite of the chaos. The health of workers and the environment were irreparably damaged and this revolutionary better future was still far away but this overall seemed like a step in the right direction.

Moscow metro system

A massive project completed during the second year plan with great works of art as an example of the greatness of the country. Based off Stalinist architecture it was a success of this policy.