One of the most important tasks for further strengthening the country's economy was the revival of industry, transport and agriculture in the territory liberated from the Nazi invaders. In the first half of 1945, the front of restoration work expanded significantly. At the call of the Communist Party, the struggle for the fulfillment of this task acquired a nationwide character. The whole country, all the fraternal republics came to the aid of the affected regions and districts. The Central Committee of the Party, the Central Committee of the Communist Parties of the Union Republics, the regional and regional committees of the Party carried out a great deal of organizational work to mobilize forces and means for the restoration of the national economy.
Restoration work was carried out even in conditions when the war continued to divert huge human and material resources. On the devastated, scorched land, 25 million people were left homeless. They huddled in dugouts and in preserved cellars of houses. Personal consumption of the population in 1945 did not exceed 60-65 percent of the pre-war level. There were not enough clothes and shoes. Many hundreds and thousands of industrial enterprises, mines, railway stations, schools, various secondary and higher educational institutions, libraries, cultural and educational institutions lay in ruins. The war caused great damage to agriculture. Our country, writes L. I. Brezhnev, "was forced to start almost from scratch in many areas ... the Second World War destroyed a third of our national wealth" (819) .
The bourgeois press asserted that without the help of the West, and above all the United States, the Soviet Union was unable to restore its economy. But these predictions did not come true. The country of socialism with its own forces overcame the consequences of the war in an unprecedentedly short time. It was truly the greatest labor feat of the Soviet people. The Communist Party and the government attached particular importance to the most rational distribution and use of labor resources and material resources, in other words, to targeted planning of the entire range of measures to revive the ruined economy in a short time.
The restoration of cities and villages, mainly dwellings and cultural and community institutions, proceeded on an unprecedentedly broad front. In 1943 - 1945. about 25 million square meters of living space were put into operation in cities and workers' settlements. In addition, 1.4 million residential buildings in rural areas have been rehabilitated and rebuilt. Along with this, thousands of schools, hospitals, children's and cultural institutions were restored.
Prominent Party leaders were directly in charge of the restoration of the national economy and culture in the areas liberated and affected by the war. By the end of the war, work began on drawing up a five-year plan for the restoration and development of the national economy of the USSR for 1946-1950, which was completed in November 1945 (820) .
As before, great attention was paid to the revival of Donbass. On April 13, the State Defense Committee adopted a resolution that significantly expanded the scope of work, determined specific measures to restore all the main coal mines in the basin and increase coal production. In 1945, the Donets Basin was supposed to provide the bulk of the increase in coal in the USSR. In June, coal production here was to be increased to 100,000 tons per day, including 30,000 tons of coking coal. The Central Committee of the Party and the State Defense Committee took measures to provide personnel for the restored mines. Many evacuated workers, engineers, technicians were returned to Donbass, and new contingents also arrived! workers. In 1944 - 1945. 293 thousand workers were sent here. The scale of housing and cultural and domestic construction increased. The material conditions of life of the miners improved. Great importance was attached to the mechanization of coal mining and the creation of underground transport. The party and the government demanded that the revival of Donbass be carried out on a new technical basis. In the first half of 1945, the degree of mechanization of labor-intensive work, such as cutting and breaking in stopes, reached 90 percent.
Returning life to the coal base of the South of the country, the Soviet people showed perseverance, creative initiative and ingenuity. Advanced methods of work, rationalization proposals were introduced everywhere, unused reserves were identified. The entire huge complex of restoration work in the Donbass was constantly in the field of view of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine and local party bodies. In January 1945, the Stalin Regional Party Committee discussed the issue “On measures to ensure coal mining and restoration work at the Stalinugol Combine”, and in February, at the plenum of the Voroshilovgrad Regional Party Committee, the issue “On measures to restore the main and medium mines of the Voroshilovgradugol Combine” and adopted a detailed decision on it. As a result of the organizational work of the party and the efforts of the Soviet people, already in May the miners of Donbass produced more coal than any other basin of the Soviet Union.
Power plants were resurrected at a rapid pace. 120 industrial enterprises from 53 cities of the country participated in the restoration of the Dnieper hydroelectric power station named after V. I. Lenin. In Belorussia in the first half of 1945, the total capacity of power plants raised from the ruins reached 55 percent of the pre-war level.
By the end of the war, 7.5 thousand industrial enterprises were put into operation and operated in the liberated territory, more than 115 thousand kilometers of railway lines were restored. As a result of the selfless labor of the Soviet people, the industrial production of the liberated regions was restored by about a third compared to 1940.
The Soviet Armed Forces also provided assistance to the national economy. According to the decisions of the State Defense Committee, a significant number of cars were transferred to the districts and regions affected by the war. Industrial and power equipment, agricultural machinery, cultural and other valuables, taken out by fascist robbers from the USSR, were returned. The trophy service of the Soviet Army collected and shipped scrap metal for the needs of the national economy (821).
Great efforts were concentrated on the restoration of agriculture. The work was carried out in accordance with the resolutions of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, according to which evacuated equipment returned to the liberated areas, and their supply with vehicles, fuel, and spare parts was carried out in the first place. The country sent experienced personnel to agriculture. From various republics, territories, regions of the USSR, seeds, agricultural machinery, working and productive livestock were sent to these regions. In 1945, the liberated regions received 44,600 draft horses, 26,400 draft oxen, 436,000 cattle, 980,000 sheep and goats, and 127,600 pigs (822).
As a result of the organizational work of the Party, great help from the state and the entire people, and the greatest efforts of agricultural workers, 85,000 collective farms, all state farms and MTS were restored by the end of the war. The sown area in the liberated regions in 1945 amounted to 72 percent of the pre-war, and the area under grain crops - 79 percent. Such results in such a short time could be achieved only under the conditions of the socialist system, using the advantages and viability of collective farms and state farms, with all-people fraternal assistance, which testifies to the strength of friendship between the peoples of the USSR.
The war in Europe was approaching its victorious end. New tasks arose before the Soviet people: without weakening military efforts, to carry out the transition to peaceful production. There was a huge amount and complexity of work to be done in all spheres of the life of Soviet society - to determine new proportions in the national economy in accordance with the tasks of peaceful socialist construction, to redistribute material and human reserves, to raise the standard of living of people. It was necessary to switch in a short time and at minimal cost hundreds of thousands of enterprises that carried out military orders to the production of peaceful products, to the production of consumer goods.
The Central Committee of the Party and the Soviet government led the preparations for the transition to peaceful construction. The state and party bodies considered projects for the restructuring of the apparatus, issues related to the upcoming demobilization from the Armed Forces. New departments and departments were created in the people's commissariats, design bureaus were created at the factories, the work of which should now be aimed at ensuring the release of peaceful products, the plans of research institutions were adjusted in order to switch forces to the development of problems related to the development of the national economy. Not a single important national economic problem was left out of the sight of the Party, its Central Committee, or government agencies.
The day of victory over fascist Germany was the day of the country's decisive turn to peaceful life. On May 26, the State Defense Committee adopted a resolution "On measures for the restructuring of industry in connection with a reduction in the production of weapons." On June 17, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR approved the national economic plan for the third quarter. In the same month, more than 500 enterprises were transferred to civilian production. Textile, light and food industry enterprises have increased the output of goods for the population. The transition to an eight-hour working day has begun. Mandatory overtime work was abolished.
On June 22, 1945 - exactly four years after the attack of fascist Germany on the Soviet Union - a session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR opened in Moscow, which adopted the law "On the demobilization of the older ages of the personnel of the active army." Over 3 million soldiers returned to peaceful labor. It was the largest event in the country's transition to peaceful construction.
The restoration in a short time of a significant part of the national economy destroyed by the war is the greatest feat of the entire people, led by the Communist Party. The unprecedented scale of restoration work, the enormous labor enthusiasm of the Soviet people became possible only under the conditions of the socialist system. The victory over the enemy came at a high cost to the Soviet people, but it opened up a broad opportunity to direct the country's productive forces to peaceful construction.
The first half of 1945 was characterized by the further strengthening of the internal and international position of the Soviet Union. The Communist Party, relying on the advantages of the socialist system and the Marxist-Leninist ideology, ensured a new upsurge in the creative activity of the people. There were solid economic foundations and spiritual forces of the Soviet society for the rapid end of the war in Europe and the transfer of the economy to a peaceful track.
Along with military production, work was carried out on a broad front to restore the national economy, an increasing number of industrial enterprises switched to the production of civilian products. The country not only fought, but also took confident steps towards peaceful construction. The strength and inviolability of its internal position were especially noticeable against the background of those sharp antagonistic contradictions that are characteristic of the economy of capitalist states.
The titanic activity of the Communist Party ensured the strengthening and development of the military-economic base of the USSR at the final stage of the war in Europe. It was her activity that was the most important source of the historical victory of socialist society over fascism.
The better economic and political organization of the socialist state made it possible to mobilize and make more efficient use of material and human resources much more fully and quickly. The military, economic, ideological and political victory of the Soviet people in the war against fascist Germany was achieved under the leadership of the Communist Party, as a result of its enormous political and organizational activities.
At 3:30 am, when the fascist German troops received the prearranged signal "Dortmund", an artillery strike was suddenly launched at the Soviet border outposts and fortifications, and a few minutes later the enemy hordes invaded the USSR. Large German aviation forces unleashed thousands of tons of lethal cargo on Soviet airfields, bridges, warehouses, railways, naval bases, communication lines and centers, on sleeping cities. A giant fiery tornado raged in the border regions of the country. For the Soviet people, the cruel and incredibly difficult Great Patriotic War began.
The invading army numbered 5.5 million people, about 4,300 tanks and assault guns, 4,980 combat aircraft, 47,200 guns and mortars.
She was opposed by the forces of five Soviet western border districts and three fleets, which were almost twice as inferior to the enemy in manpower, had a slightly smaller amount of artillery, and outnumbered the enemy in tanks and aircraft, however, for the most part obsolete models. As for the first echelon of the armies, here the Hitlerite command deployed 103 divisions, including 10 tank divisions, while in the first echelon of our covering armies there were only 56 rifle and cavalry divisions.
The superiority of the fascist German troops in the directions of the main attacks was especially overwhelming. By the end of the first day of the war, their powerful tank groups in many sectors of the front wedged into the depths of Soviet territory at a distance of 25 to 35, in some places even up to 50 km. By July 10, the depth of the enemy invasion in the decisive directions was already from 300 to 600 km. Nearly 200 warehouses with fuel, ammunition and weapons located in the border zone fell into the hands of the enemy.
The suddenly attacked units of the Red Army were forced to engage in heavy fighting without the necessary training and without completing the strategic deployment, being 60-70% manned to wartime states with a limited amount of materiel, transport, communications, often without air and artillery support.
Under the blows of the advancing aggressor, the soldiers of the Red Army were surrounded, suffered heavy defeats and setbacks. During the three weeks of the war, the enemy managed to completely defeat 28 Soviet divisions. In addition, more than 72 divisions suffered losses in people and military equipment (from 50% and more). Our total losses in divisions alone, excluding reinforcement and combat support units, during this time amounted to about 850 thousand people, up to 6 thousand tanks, at least 6.5 thousand guns of 76 mm caliber and above, more than 3 thousand anti-tank guns, about 12 thousand mortars, as well as about 3.5 thousand aircraft.
The enemy lost about 100 thousand soldiers and officers, more than 1700 tanks and assault guns and 950 aircraft (History of the USSR. 1992. No. 2. P. 4).
Describing the reasons for the failures of the Soviet Armed Forces in the first months of the war, many historians refer to very serious mistakes made by the Soviet leadership in the prewar years. First of all, it should be noted that the weakening of the command staff caused by pre-war repressions played a negative role. By the beginning of the war, about 75% of commanders and 70% of political workers had been in their positions for less than one year. Even the Chief of the General Staff of the Land Forces of Nazi Germany, Colonel General F. Halder, noted in his diary in May 1941: “The Russian officer corps is exceptionally bad. It makes a worse impression than in 1933. It will take Russia 20 years until it reaches its former heights".
Among the serious mistakes of the Soviet leadership, one should also include a miscalculation in determining the time of a possible attack by fascist Germany on the USSR.
Stalin and his entourage believed that the Nazi leadership would not dare to violate the non-aggression pact concluded with the USSR in the near future. All the information received through various channels about the upcoming German attack was considered by Stalin as provocative, aimed at exacerbating relations with Germany. This may also explain the government's assessment of the TASS statement of June 14, 1941, in which the rumors of an impending German attack were declared provocative. This also explained the fact that the directive on bringing the troops of the western military districts to combat readiness and occupying combat lines by them was given too late. Essentially, the directive was received by the troops when the war had already begun.
Tens of thousands of works have been published on the history of the Great Patriotic War, including fundamental multi-volume publications that comprehensively reflect the events of the war years, major military operations that had a turning point in World War II, and much more. Anyone interested in more detailed history of the war can study this literature. We will focus on showing the main areas of activity of the Soviet rear and the combat operations of the Soviet Armed Forces in military-strategic operations on the war fronts.
The offensive of the Nazi troops caused enormous damage to the country's economy. The territory of the country, where more than 31 thousand industrial enterprises, about 100 thousand collective farms, a huge number of state farms and MTS, tens of thousands of kilometers of railway lines, fell under the blow of enemy troops. Huge damage was done to the production of military products. From August to November 1941, more than 30 enterprises manufacturing ammunition were out of action. The situation developed in such a way that with the outbreak of the war, the country temporarily lost a number of large regions that were the most economically developed. Suffice it to say that on the territory of these regions before the war, products worth 46 billion rubles were produced, which accounted for about 40% of the country's total gross output. The share of the occupied regions in the production of heavy industry products was especially high. The most important areas for the extraction of strategic raw materials fell into the hands of the enemy. enterprises for the production of handling and power equipment.
Heavy damage was also done to the light and food industries. In essence, the raw material base of food industry enterprises was undermined, since 88% of sugar beet crops, about 60% of sunflower crops, more than 50% of tobacco and shag plantations and other crops were concentrated in the areas covered by hostilities. More than 30 canning factories were devastated for raw materials.
The temporary loss of the most important economic regions caused enormous damage to the economy of the USSR. For a long time, the large production capacities of many of its important branches were put out of action. In order to give a fuller picture of the losses of heavy industry, we note that before the war these capacities accounted for about 1/2 of the output of ferrous metals and 2/3 of the entire coal production in the country. As a result of the losses incurred at the beginning of the war, fixed production assets in 1941 decreased by 28% in comparison with the pre-war level, and in 1942 they decreased even more.
The restructuring of the entire life of the country on a military basis began from the first days of the war, on June 23, 1941, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command was formed, designed to exercise the highest strategic leadership of the Armed Forces.
On June 29, 1941, the Directive of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks was adopted by the Party and Soviet organizations of the front-line regions, which clearly spoke of the danger hanging over our country, and outlined a number of priority tasks for restructuring the economy on a war footing. To mobilize all the forces and means of the country to fight the Nazi aggressor, it was necessary to create other government bodies. Such a form of organization of power in military conditions was found in the State Defense Committee, created on June 30, 1941 under the chairmanship of I. V. Stalin. It also included V. M. Molotov, L. P. Beria, K. E. Voroshilov, G. M. Malenkov and others. All power in the state was concentrated in the hands of the GKO: all citizens, party and Soviet, Komsomol and military bodies were obliged to unquestioningly carry out the decisions and orders of the State Defense Committee. In order to further concentrate the power of the State Defense Committee of the USSR, in the autumn of 1941, in more than 60 cities of the front line, local emergency authorities - city defense committees - were established. They were headed by the first secretaries of the regional committees or city committees of the party. City defense committees promptly supervised the mobilization of the population and material resources for the construction of defensive lines, the creation of a people's militia, organized the conversion of local enterprises to the production of weapons and military equipment.
Speaking of the State Defense Committee, it should be emphasized that a similar form of power organization already existed in the Soviet state. A peculiar prototype of the State Defense Committee was the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense, created back in the years of the Civil War and foreign intervention.
However, the emergency authorities during the years of the Civil War and the Great Patriotic War differed significantly. The main feature of the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense was that it did not replace party, government and military bodies. The fundamental questions of the conduct of an armed war were considered at the same time at the Politburo and Orgburo of the Central Committee, at meetings of the Council of People's Commissars.
During the Great Patriotic War, no plenums, let alone party congresses, were held, all cardinal issues were decided by the State Defense Committee (GKO).
Operational issues, as a rule, were considered solely by its chairman or individual members. It was also characteristic of the work of the State Defense Committee that even the most important problems of state life and military development were often solved by questioning. This approach often led to subjectivism, but in the current situation it turned out to be inevitable. It is known that during the war Stalin held a number of important party, state and military posts. He was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR, and headed the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command.
In the emergency conditions of the war, the result of strict centralization was the prompt and concrete solution of practical issues. Every day they appeared in dozens, hundreds, required coordination and clarification. The scope of the activities of the GKO can be judged at least by the fact that during its existence (from June 30, 1941 to September 4, 1945) it adopted about 10 thousand resolutions and decisions. About 2/3 of them in one way or another related to the economy and the organization of military production.
The decrees and orders of the State Defense Committee had the force of martial law and were subject to unquestioning implementation. The State Defense Committee directly supervised the creation of the military economy, its development, the strengthening of the Armed Forces, coordinated the needs of the active armies and navy with the capabilities of industry. This contributed to the most complete and expedient use of the military industry in the interests of victory. For the prompt resolution of issues under the State Defense Committee, special committees were created, commissions were formed.
The formation of the State Defense Committee and the Headquarters introduced appropriate changes into the practice of work of party and Soviet bodies that had developed in peacetime conditions. From the subordination of the Council of People's Commissars stood out everything that was directly connected with the conduct of the war: the military economy, and above all military production, strengthening and supplying the Armed Forces, and, finally, the leadership of military operations. The People's Commissariats of Defense, the Navy, the People's Commissariats of the Defense Industry and many other departments and departments that were directly related to the conduct of the war came under the jurisdiction of the State Defense Committee and the Headquarters. Under these conditions, the Council of People's Commissars is focusing its attention on those sectors that were not directly connected with military production, in particular, on the management of agricultural production.
An extraordinary form of party leadership was also introduced in the Armed Forces. It became the institute of military commissars. Simultaneously with the creation of the institution of military commissars, the Central Committee of the party reorganized the army and navy organs of political propaganda into political departments that directed both organizational-party and political-mass work. With the beginning of the war, the importance of military councils in the troops increased. In the first six months, 10 military councils of the fronts and about 30 military councils of the armies were created. A large number of experienced workers, major party and state leaders were introduced into their composition.
From the first days of the war, another emergency institution was also expanded - the institution of party organizers of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, as well as party organizers of the Central Committee of the Communist Parties of the Union republics, regional committees, and regional committees at the most important enterprises. Party organizers of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks were appointed to all military factories and enterprises of the defense industry, and to smaller ones - party organizers of the Central Committee of the parties of the union republics, regional committees, and regional committees. Party organizers were at the same time secretaries of factory party organizations, carried out their direct connection with the Central Committee of the party, local organizations. This system of emergency bodies of party leadership of the economy was supplemented by the political departments of machine and tractor stations and state farms created in November 1941. Thanks to all these measures, the national economy of our country was able to overcome the difficulties of military restructuring and, on the whole, provided the front with everything necessary. At the same time, the parallel existence of people's commissariats, local Soviet bodies and party structures for managing the national economy sometimes led to mistakes and incompetent decisions.
An important part of perestroika was the redistribution of party forces from rear organizations to military ones, as a result of which a significant number of communists went over to military work. Prominent party workers with extensive experience in organizational and mass political work were sent to direct military work in the army. As a result, in the initial period of the war, more than 500 secretaries of the Central Committee of the parties of the Union republics, regional, regional committees, city committees, and district committees were sent to the army and navy. All in all, during the Great Patriotic War, about 14,000 executives were mobilized into the Armed Forces.
One of the main tasks that had to be solved from the first days of the war was the fastest transfer of the national economy, the entire economy of the country, to a military footing. The main line of this restructuring was determined in the Directive of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR of June 29, 1941. Specific measures for the restructuring of the national economy began to be carried out from the first days of the war. On the second day of the war, a mobilization plan for the production of ammunition and cartridges was introduced. And on June 30, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR approved a mobilization national economic plan for the third quarter of 1941. However, events at the front developed so unsuccessfully for us that this plan was not fulfilled. Given the current situation, on July 4, 1941, it was decided to urgently develop a new plan for the development of military production. The commission, headed by N. A. Voznesensky, First Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, was instructed to develop "a military-economic plan for ensuring the country's defense, bearing in mind the use of resources and enterprises located on the Volga, in Western Siberia and the Urals." In two weeks this commission developed a new plan for the fourth quarter of 1941 and for 1942 for the regions of the Volga region, the Urals, Western Siberia, Kazakhstan and Central Asia.
For the speedy deployment of a production base in the regions of the Volga region, the Urals, Western Siberia, Kazakhstan and Central Asia, it was recognized as necessary to transfer the industrial enterprises of the Narkommunitions, Narkomvooruzheniya, Narkomaviaprom, etc. to these areas.
Members of the Politburo, who were at the same time members of the State Defense Committee, carried out general management of the main branches of the military economy. N. A. Voznesensky dealt with the production of weapons and ammunition, G. M. Malenkov - aircraft and aircraft engines, V. M. Molotov - tanks, A. I. Mikoyan and others - food, fuel and clothing. A. I. Shakhurin - aviation industry, B. L. Vannikov - ammunition, I. F. Tevosyan - ferrous metallurgy, A. I. Efremov - machine-tool industry, V. V. Vakhrushev - coal, I. I. Sedin - oil .
The main link in the transition of the national economy to a military footing was the restructuring of industry. The transfer of industry to war footing meant a radical restructuring of the entire process of social production, a change in its direction and proportions. Almost all mechanical engineering was transferred to military rails. In November 1941, the People's Commissariat for General Engineering was transformed into the People's Commissariat for Mortar Weapons. In addition to the people's commissariats of the aviation industry, shipbuilding, armaments and ammunition, created before the war, two people's commissariats were formed at the beginning of the war - the tank and mortar industries. Thanks to this, all the decisive branches of the military industry received specialized centralized management. The production of jet mortars, which existed before the war only in prototypes, was started. Their production was organized at the Moscow plant "Compressor". The front-line soldiers gave the name "Katyusha" to the first missile combat installation.
At the beginning of the war, a change was made to the distribution of food resources. Significant food supplies were lost during the hostilities. The available resources were directed primarily to supply the Red Army and provide for the population of industrial areas. The card system was introduced in the country.
Military restructuring required a centralized redistribution of the country's labor resources. If at the beginning of 1941 there were more than 31 million workers and employees in the country, then by the end of 1941 their number had decreased to 18.5 million people. In order to provide personnel for the military industry and related industries, it was necessary to rationally distribute the remaining labor resources and involve new sections of the population in production. For these purposes, already on June 30, 1941, the Committee for the Distribution of Labor was formed under the Council of People's Commissars.
At the same time, mandatory overtime work was introduced and vacations were cancelled. This made it possible to increase the utilization of production capacities by about a third without increasing the number of workers and employees. In July 1941, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR granted the right to the union and autonomous republics, the executive committees of the regional and regional Soviets, if necessary, to transfer workers and employees to work at other enterprises, regardless of their departmental affiliation and territorial location. This allowed local authorities to more quickly maneuver personnel in the interests of strengthening the defense industries.
Thanks to this, by the second half of 1941, it was possible to do a lot of work on the redistribution of personnel. As a result, by January 1942, more than 120 thousand people were additionally sent to the defense industry.
At the same time, the process of training workers through the system of labor reserves was actively carried out. In just two years, about 1,100,000 people were trained through this system for work in industry.
For the same purposes, in February 1942, the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR "On the mobilization of able-bodied urban population for work in production and construction" was adopted in February 1942, which provided for appropriate mobilization. In the very first days of the war, a decision was made to restructure the work of scientific institutions of the USSR Academy of Sciences, subordinating their activities to the interests of strengthening the state's defense capability. In the course of perestroika, the Academy of Sciences solved three interrelated tasks: 1) the development of scientific problems of defense importance; 2) scientific assistance to industry in improving and developing production; and 3) mobilization of the country's raw materials, replacement of scarce materials with local raw materials, organization of scientific research on the most pressing wartime issues.
Thus, the redistribution of the country's material, financial and labor resources, carried out from the very beginning of the war, played a decisive role in the restructuring of the entire national economy on a war footing. The change in economic proportions, the switching of all forces and means to serve the front laid a solid foundation for creating a well-coordinated economy in war conditions. During the restructuring of the national economy, the eastern industrial base became the main center of the war economy of the USSR, which was significantly expanded and strengthened with the outbreak of war.
In 1942, the production of military products in the Urals increased by more than 6 times compared to 1940, in Western Siberia - by 27, and in the Volga region - by 9 times. On the whole, during the war, industrial production in these regions more than tripled. This was a great military and economic victory achieved by the Soviet people during the difficult war years. It laid a solid foundation for the final victory over fascist Germany.
With the beginning of the war, in the conditions of an unfavorable development of military events, the fastest evacuation of the population, industrial enterprises, agricultural products, cultural and other state values from the front-line regions into the interior of the country was the most important political, military-economic problem facing the Soviet people. In the memoirs of A. I. Mikoyan, who was a member of the GKO during the war years, interesting information is provided on this subject: “Two days after the start of the war ... the question arose of the need to lead the evacuation from the front line. The idea of organizing an organ with such functions we have had never occurred before... It became clear that the evacuation was on a huge scale. It was impossible to evacuate everything in a row, there was not enough time or transport. We had to literally choose on the go what was in the interests of the state to evacuate ... "(Military History Journal 1988, No. 3, pp. 31-38). In the complex of these problems, the fastest removal and saving of millions of Soviet people from physical destruction was one of the priorities.
The accomplishment of such a difficult task required enormous efforts. The resolution of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR dated June 27, 1941 "On the procedure for the removal and placement of human contingents and valuable property" defined specific tasks and the order of evacuation. In addition to this, on July 5, 1941, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR issued a decision on the procedure for evacuating the population in wartime and on the removal of workers and employees of evacuated enterprises. Plans were developed for the evacuation of people from the front line, indicating resettlement points, terms, order and sequence of removal.
By the decision of the government, the "Regulations on the evacuation point for the evacuation of the civilian population from the front line" was approved. The evacuation centers set up locally took care of the evacuated population, kept a record of the arrivals, etc. Departments for the evacuation of the population were created under the councils of people's commissars of the union republics, regional executive committees and regional executive committees. By decision of the government, first of all, children's institutions, women with children and the elderly were taken out. By January 1942, 10 million people were transported into the interior of the country by rail alone (World War II. General problems. Book 1, p. 74).
Great difficulties arose with the evacuation of the population in areas that were in the zone of military operations. These included the republics located in the Baltic states, the western regions of Ukraine, Moldova and Belarus, and Karelia.
At the beginning of the war, the evacuation of the population was also carried out from Moscow and Leningrad. The following facts testify to the scale of this work: in the autumn of 1941, 1.5 million people were evacuated from Moscow alone, and from January 22, 1942 to April 15, 1942, more than 55 thousand people were evacuated from Leningrad. This was the most difficult period of the evacuation. In general, during the war years, including the blockade period, about 2 million people were evacuated from Leningrad.
As a result of the successful evacuation, by the spring of 1942, up to 8 million evacuees were placed in the eastern regions of the country. By this time, the main wave of evacuation subsided.
However, this situation did not last long. In the summer of 1942, in connection with the breakthrough of the Nazi troops to the North Caucasus, the problem of mass evacuation of the population again arose with all its acuteness. This time the evacuation was carried out mainly from the central and southern regions of the European part of the USSR. In July 1942, the evacuation of the population from the Voronezh, Voroshilovgrad, Orel, Rostov, Stalingrad regions and the Stavropol and Krasnodar regions began.
The Soviet government showed great concern for the creation of material and living conditions for the evacuated population. In the state budget for the fourth quarter of 1941, 200 billion rubles were allocated for housing construction. In wartime conditions, these were large funds. Workers and employees of the evacuated enterprises were given a long-term loan for individual housing construction.
During the stay of the evacuees in new places, the local population surrounded them with care and attention. Families in need were given allowances, clothes and shoes were sold. In many agricultural artels, courses were organized to train evacuees in various agricultural professions.
The fraternal friendship of the Soviet peoples manifested itself during the evacuation, in the employment of the evacuated population, in the adoption of children whose parents had died. In less than a year of the war, by May 1, 1942, up to 2 thousand orphaned children were adopted by the working people of Kazakhstan alone. In Uzbekistan, a public movement to help evacuated children has developed widely. Thousands of children - Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians and other nationalities - were taken to Uzbek families for education. The evacuated children felt great in the families that sheltered them. They spoke not only Russian, but also learned to speak Uzbek. Orphanages were created at large agricultural artels, the maintenance of which was completely taken over by the collective farms.
As a result of the evacuation, millions of Soviet people were saved from physical extermination by the fascist invaders.
The evacuation of the population, industrial enterprises, agricultural products and cultural values in different economic regions took place at different times, depending on the situation on the fronts. The specific conditions of the military situation demanded that the evacuation be carried out twice: the first time - in the summer and autumn of 1941, the second time - in the summer and autumn of 1942. The evacuation of 1941 was the most massive.
Without dwelling in detail on the evacuation of industry, I would like to note only the following. During the war years, more than 2 thousand industrial enterprises were evacuated to the eastern regions. Almost 70% of them were located in the Urals, Western Siberia, Central Asia and Kazakhstan. The transfer of industry to the rear made it possible not only to preserve the main production assets, but also to gradually increase them, meeting the growing needs of the front.
The evacuation of the population, industry, food and raw materials carried out by the Soviet people during the Great Patriotic War, the export of cultural property to the deep rear contributed to the speedy restructuring of the entire national economy of the country on a war footing and the approach of victory. As the outstanding Soviet commander, Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov noted: "It was an incomparable labor epic, without which our victory over the strongest enemy would be absolutely impossible."
The restoration and development of the national economy of the USSR in the post-war years took place in difficult conditions. The country, especially its European part, was in complete ruin - industry and agriculture practically had to be restored anew. The country has lost about 30% of national wealth. The situation was aggravated by the lack of financial and human resources. About 28 million people died on the fronts of the war, in fascist captivity, died of starvation and disease. The consequences of the war were hundreds of thousands of orphans, widows, old people, whose children and close relatives died in battles with the Nazi invaders.
In the first year after the war, the country's leadership took a number of measures to switch to peaceful construction. So, in May 1945, the State Defense Committee transferred part of the defense enterprises to the production of consumer goods. In September 1945, this Committee was abolished due to the end of its wartime functions. Peaceful construction was headed by the Council of People's Commissars, which in 1946 was transformed into the Council of Ministers of the USSR. On the basis of the military people's commissariats, new ones were created - the people's commissariat for mechanical engineering and instrument making, the people's commissariat for tractor building, etc.
In order to normalize the working regime, overtime work was canceled, the 8-hour working day and annual paid holidays were restored.
The strategic task of the Fourth Five-Year Plan (1946-1950) was, first of all, to restore the areas of the country that were under occupation, to achieve the pre-war level of development of industry and agriculture, and then to surpass them (by 48 and 23%, respectively). The plan provided for the priority development of heavy and defense industries. Due to the reduction of appropriations for military needs, significant funds, material and human resources were directed here. It was planned to develop new coal regions, expand the metallurgical base in Kazakhstan, the Urals, Siberia, etc.
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The Soviet people as a whole fulfilled the strategic task of restoring and developing the national economy of the USSR in the post-war period.
Transition to peaceful construction. - concept and types. Classification and features of the category "Transition to peaceful construction." 2017, 2018.
The economy of Kazakhstan during the war. The role of the Karaganda coal basin during the war. 670,000 people were mobilized to work in industry. At the same time, about 1.5 million people evacuated and repressed arrived on the territory of K.-na. The...
History of the Ukrainian SSR in ten volumes. Volume Nine Team of Authors
2. TRANSITION FROM WAR TO PEACE CONSTRUCTION
2. TRANSITION FROM WAR TO PEACE CONSTRUCTION
The victorious end of the war opened a new historical stage in the life of the Soviet people. A transition was made to peaceful creative work, the healing of severe wounds inflicted by the war began. Perestroika affected all aspects of the life of the state and the people.
The war brought innumerable disasters to the Soviet people and caused colossal material damage. Particularly affected were the areas where the fascist invaders were outrageous. Only in Ukraine, the Nazis burned or destroyed 714 cities and towns and over 28 thousand villages. Millions of Soviet citizens were left homeless and forced to live in basements and dugouts. The occupants destroyed more than 16 thousand enterprises, over 200 thousand industrial and production facilities. The direct damage caused by the Nazis to the national economy of the republic amounted to 285 billion rubles, which was almost 5 times higher than the expenses in the Ukrainian SSR for the construction of new plants, factories, railways, power plants and other enterprises for the three pre-war five-year plans taken together. But no matter how heavy the material losses, the most severe loss was the death of 20 million Soviet people who were killed on the fronts of the Patriotic War, who died in concentration camps for prisoners of war, in hard labor in Germany, brutally destroyed by the Nazis.
The imperialists calculated that the USSR would not be able to quickly restore the national economy, that it would take decades to eliminate the grave consequences of the war. They believed that the Soviet Union would not be able to heal the wounds of the war at the expense of internal resources, would be forced to turn to the capitalist countries for help and thereby fall into bondage to them. The imperialist circles tried to deepen and complicate the economic difficulties of the USSR, aggravated the international situation, forced the arms race, and held back trade with our country.
However, the Soviet Union withstood the ordeal. A number of factors contributed to the transition of the country's economy from military to civilian tracks. In the postwar years, the social and ideological and political unity of Soviet society, socialist patriotism and proletarian internationalism became even stronger. The decisive role in the restoration and development of the country's national economy was played by the Soviet working class, hardened during the years of the pre-war five-year plans and the Great Patriotic War. The country entered into peaceful life, using the planned system of the socialist economy, the advantages of the Soviet system, the fraternal mutual assistance of all the peoples of the USSR in the development of the national economy. The friendship and mutual assistance of the fraternal peoples of our Motherland actively contributed to the successful solution of this important task.
P. G. Tychina, L. I. Bezymensky and V. I. Sosiura at the restoration of Khreshchatyk, 1945
Despite great difficulties, Soviet Ukraine was restored and renewed. The creator of all the great deeds to restore the national economy was a Soviet man, who is characterized by devotion to the cause of communism, socialist patriotism and internationalism, high socio-political and labor activity.
During the years of the revival of the national economy, the wonderful feature of the Leninist friendship of the peoples of our Motherland - mutual assistance - was revealed with special force. Fighting continued in the west, and echelons with equipment, materials, machines, tractors, and machine tools were already heading to Ukraine from all over the country.
Thanks to the efforts of all fraternal republics, the unity of interests and goals, the will and actions of all nations and nationalities of our multinational Motherland, the Ukrainian SSR has successfully revived the economy and culture. The transfer of the republic's economy to peaceful development was completed at the end of 1946. Numerous scientific, cultural, educational and medical institutions, universities and schools of Ukraine resumed their work. In solving the grandiose tasks of restoring the destroyed economy, the Soviet people, including the working people of the republic, showed selflessness, high level of organization and endurance, conscious discipline and purposefulness.
The Communist Party is the organizer of the transition to peaceful construction. At the head of the masses was invariably the Communist Party, which, on the basis of a deep analysis of political and socio-economic processes, revealed to the working people the prospects for the development of the country, aroused enormous energy in them, and organized them to solve the next problems.
In carrying out the transition of the Soviet country to peaceful construction, the Communist Party was guided by Lenin's instruction that in the conditions of a military victory and a transition to peace, all the enthusiasm and discipline of the masses must be able to be transferred to the work of peaceful economic construction. In accordance with the new conditions, the Party restructured and improved the forms and methods of its work, brought the activities of all state and economic bodies in line with the tasks of peacetime.
Already in 1944, all pre-war regional party organizations resumed their activities in the republic. The membership of the Communist Party of Ukraine was actively growing. If on January 1, 1945 there were about 165 thousand members and candidate members of the CPSU (b) in its ranks, then on January 1, 1946 - over 320 thousand, and in 1949 - already more than 684 thousand communists . In connection with the reunification of Transcarpathian Ukraine with the Ukrainian SSR, by the decision of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks of December 15, 1945, the Communist Party of Transcarpathian Ukraine became part of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks.
In accordance with the conditions of peaceful development, the forms of party and state leadership of the country were restructured. On September 4, 1945, the State Defense Committee was abolished, and all management functions were transferred to the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, whose chairman was I. V. Stalin. The organizational structure and content of the work of party bodies were restructured. In the Central Committee of the Communist Party (b)U, regional committees, city committees and district committees of the party, the activities of departments related to solving the problems of peaceful construction were expanded. The party organizations of the republic were strengthened at the expense of demobilized communists - rank and file and command and political staff. So, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks approved the head of the political department of the 4th Ukrainian Front L. I. Brezhnev as secretary of the Zaporizhzhya regional party committee, L. I. Brezhnev, secretary of the Chernigov regional party committee - the head of the underground regional party committee and partisan unit, twice Hero of the Soviet Union A. F. Fedorov. A number of experienced party, Soviet workers were sent to work in the western regions of Ukraine.
The Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks aimed party organizations at improving the style and methods of work, deep penetration into economic issues, subordinating all organizational and party-political work to the solution of specific economic-political tasks. The selection, placement and education of various sections of the cadres have improved considerably. The Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks rendered great assistance to the Party organizations of Ukraine by leading workers and specialists.
Outlining specific tasks for the restoration and development of the national economy, the Communist Party pointed out to the Soviet people the immediate goal - the further strengthening of socialism.
The Central Committee of the CP(b)U and the government of Ukraine have carried out significant work to establish peaceful labor and recreation for the working people. A normal regime was restored at enterprises and institutions, in particular, an 8-hour working day, workers and employees were given regular holidays, overtime work was abolished, etc. The Communist Party of Ukraine paid great attention to restoring the housing stock of cities and villages. At the May (1946) and March (1949) plenums of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, questions about the progress of housing and communal construction in cities and villages were specially considered.
The transition to a peaceful life led to the restructuring of state administration, aimed at improving the management of industry, agriculture and other sectors of the national economy. In March 1946, the first session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of the second convocation adopted the Law on the transformation of the Council of People's Commissars into the Council of Ministers of the USSR. At the same session, N. M. Shvernik was elected Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Before him, the supreme Soviet body in the country for 27 years was permanently led by an associate of V. I. Lenin, M. I. Kalinin. Illness prevented him from continuing to work. I. V. Stalin was approved as Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR.
At the end of 1945 - the beginning of 1946, the allied people's commissariats of the tank industry, ammunition, and mortar weapons ceased their activities. They were transformed into people's commissariats for mechanical engineering and instrumentation, transport and agricultural engineering, and the automotive industry. A number of new industrial and construction people's commissariats were created in order to deepen their specialization.
The eighth session of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR, held in August 1946, approved the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR dated March 25, 1946, on the transformation of the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR into the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR. In post-war Ukraine, N. S. Khrushchev was the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CP(b)U and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR. In December 1947, D.S. Korotchenko was appointed Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR.
During the war, elections to the Soviets of Working People's Deputies were not held. This became possible in peacetime. Preparations began for the elections to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.
In accordance with the conditions of peacetime, the work of the organs of Soviet power was reorganized, and their role in the restoration of the national economy increased. In 1946, there were 25 regional, 13 district, 79 city, 82 district in cities, 743 district and over 10.5 thousand rural and settlement Soviets of Workers' Deputies in the Ukrainian SSR.
In August 1946, the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR considered the issue of restructuring the organs of state administration, changed the organizational structure and improved the forms of work of the state apparatus of the republic. In 1947, a number of ministries were enlarged, which helped to improve the management of related and close branches of the national economy, and to reduce the administrative and managerial apparatus.
The transformation of state and public bodies in the conditions of peaceful development increased their influence on all spheres of the economic, political and state life of the Ukrainian SSR. The elections of party, Soviet, trade union and Komsomol bodies held in the first post-war years contributed to the further strengthening of their organizational and political-educational activities, the mobilization of the masses for active restoration work in all sectors of the economy and culture.
In peacetime, transformations were carried out in the Armed Forces of the USSR. Many formations and units were disbanded. On the basis of the People's Commissariats of Defense and the Navy, a single People's Commissariat of the Armed Forces of the USSR was created, in which the general leadership of the army, aviation and navy was concentrated. The Headquarters of the Supreme High Command ceased its activity, instead of it the Supreme Military Council, a collegial body that existed before the war, was restored. The Main Political Directorate of the Soviet Armed Forces and political directorates for the branches of service were created.
Immediately after the war, mass demobilization of soldiers and officers began. By the beginning of December 1946, more than 1 million 840 thousand former soldiers returned to Ukraine, and in total during the first three post-war years - about 2.2 million, most of whom went to work in the national economy.
To organize the recruitment and employment of former soldiers, republican, regional, city and district commissions were created, headed by the secretaries of the respective party committees. The demobilized were provided with travel, food, uniforms, and a one-time cash allowance at the expense of the state. Not later than a month later, they were provided with work and housing.
The invalids and the families of the dead soldiers were surrounded by care. Simultaneously with the demobilization, work was underway to repatriate Soviet prisoners of war and citizens driven into captivity by the Nazis to many countries of the world.
Transferring the economy to a peaceful track. Successes in the restoration and further development of the national economy largely depended on the prompt transfer of enterprises to the production of peacetime products. Taking this into account, on May 26, 1945, the State Defense Committee adopted a resolution “On measures to restructure industry in connection with a reduction in the production of weapons”, which specifically determined enterprises transferred to the production of civilian products, consumer goods.
The transition of the national economy to peaceful life proceeded under conditions of certain difficulties. It was necessary to significantly change the production processes, taking into account the needs of the time and the requirements of scientific and technological progress. The transition of the economy to the production of products for the needs of peaceful construction meant the creation of new organizational forms of production, a radical redistribution of material, technical, labor and financial resources in the country, the switching of production capacities to peaceful sectors of the economy, the establishment of appropriate economic ties and cooperation, as well as the proportions between sectors of the national economy. economy.
Industrial enterprises of the Ukrainian SSR received certain planned targets for the production of products for peaceful purposes, increased capital investments in various sectors of the economy. A large number of demobilized soldiers joined the labor collectives of factories, factories, construction sites, transport, who were combat-hardened on the fronts of the war and who were characterized by deep ideological conviction, steadfastness, and purposefulness. These valuable traits were passed on by yesterday's servicemen to the younger generation.
The working people of the Soviet Ukraine, carrying out titanic work to restore the national economy, overcame a number of objective difficulties. Worn-out machines and equipment did not work at full capacity, there was a shortage of raw materials, building materials, machine tools, and equipment. Mastering the production of peaceful products required the development of new technological processes, the re-equipment of workshops, and the revision of cooperation between enterprises and industries. The change in the nature of production necessitated certain training and retraining of workers and engineering and technical personnel.
Of great importance for the transfer of the economy to a peaceful track was the reduction in appropriations for military needs. To solve the main tasks of restructuring all sectors of the national economy of the republic in accordance with the conditions of peacetime, the resolution of the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR of September 29, 1946 "On annual and quarterly economic plans" was sent, adopted in accordance with a similar resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR.
As a result of the great organizational work of the Communist Party and the growth of the people's initiative, the transition of the economy to the production of peaceful products in the republic, as well as throughout the country, took place in a short time. This was facilitated primarily by the socialist economic system, public ownership of the means of production. The Party organizations of the Ukraine constantly took care of the development of socialist emulation, educated the working people on the basis of the best examples, enriched and disseminated progressive experience. Communists and Komsomol members were sent to the most critical areas of restoration work.
Industrial enterprises were refurbished. Machine-building plants that worked for the needs of the war switched to the production of agricultural machines and machine tools. Metallurgical plants instead of armor and shell blanks began to produce products for peaceful purposes. The chemical industry produced mineral fertilizers instead of explosives.
In December 1945, several large enterprises of the republic were transferred to the People's Commissariat for Agricultural Engineering, including factories: Odessa named after. October Revolution, Kirovograd "Red Star", Osipenkovsky "Pervomaisky", Zaporozhye "Kommunar", Kharkov them. M. V. Frunze, "Hammer and Sickle" and the Lvov Plant of Agricultural Machines. On the basis of the Kyiv Tank Repair Plant, a motorcycle plant arose, and the Dnepropetrovsk Aviation Plant - a plant for the production of tools and non-standard equipment for the automotive industry, etc.
By decision of the government, military institutions not only transferred enterprises to civilian departments, but also helped them to establish the production of peaceful products. Considering the special importance of the restoration and further development of transport engineering in the country, including in the Ukrainian SSR, the Voroshilovgrad Locomotive Plant and the Mariupol Transport Engineering Plant were primarily provided with raw materials and everything necessary.
The light, food and meat industries, which produced products for the needs of the army during the war, began to produce them for the population. The vast majority of light industry enterprises in the Ukrainian SSR already in 1946 switched to the production of consumer goods and began to expand their production capacities.
During the restructuring of the national economy, the complex problem of personnel for industrial enterprises, construction, transport, and agriculture was solved. Measures were taken to replenish labor collectives with demobilized soldiers and workers transferred from the defense industry to the civilian industry. In connection with the organized recruitment of labor and the need for mass training of personnel for the peaceful economy, the Ministry of Labor Reserves of the USSR was created.
Socialist state planning contributed to the solution of the tasks of the transition to peaceful life. During the war years, annual military-economic plans were in effect, during the implementation of which clarifications were often made. The restructuring of the national economy required planning for a longer period. In August 1945, the Communist Party and the Soviet government instructed the State Planning Committee of the USSR to draw up a five-year plan for the restoration and development of the national economy of the USSR for 1946–1950. Work has begun on the preparation of such a plan in Ukraine. The Central Committee of the CP(b)U and the government of the republic attracted a large number of party, Soviet and economic workers, and scientists to this important cause.
The Communist Party put forward a broad concrete program for the post-war development of the country, for transferring the economy to a peaceful track. In solving it, the party, using the advantages of the Soviet socialist system and taking into account the objective laws of social development, directed the creative energy and efforts of the working people to the restoration and further development of the country's national economy.
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From the book Building and Architecture in Ancient Egypt by Clark SomersThe restructuring of the entire life of the country on a military basis began from the first days of the war, on June 23, 1941, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command was formed, designed to exercise the highest strategic leadership of the Armed Forces.
On June 29, 1941, the Directive of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks was adopted by the Party and Soviet organizations of the front-line regions, which clearly spoke of the danger hanging over our country, and outlined a number of priority tasks for restructuring the economy on a war footing. To mobilize all the forces and means of the country to fight the Nazi aggressor, it was necessary to create other government bodies. Such a form of organization of power in military conditions was found in the State Defense Committee, created on June 30, 1941 under the chairmanship of I. V. Stalin. It also included V. M. Molotov, L. P. Beria, K. E. Voroshilov, G. M. Malenkov and others. All power in the state was concentrated in the hands of the GKO: all citizens, party and Soviet, Komsomol and military bodies were obliged to unquestioningly carry out the decisions and orders of the State Defense Committee. In order to further concentrate the power of the State Defense Committee of the USSR, in the autumn of 1941, in more than 60 cities of the front line, local emergency authorities - city defense committees - were established. They were headed by the first secretaries of the regional committees or city committees of the party. City defense committees promptly supervised the mobilization of the population and material resources for the construction of defensive lines, the creation of a people's militia, organized the conversion of local enterprises to the production of weapons and military equipment.
Speaking of the State Defense Committee, it should be emphasized that a similar form of power organization already existed in the Soviet state. A peculiar prototype of the State Defense Committee was the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense, created back in the years of the Civil War and foreign intervention.
However, the emergency authorities during the years of the Civil War and the Great Patriotic War differed significantly. The main feature of the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense was that it did not replace party, government and military bodies. The fundamental questions of the conduct of an armed war were considered at the same time at the Politburo and Orgburo of the Central Committee, at meetings of the Council of People's Commissars.
During the Great Patriotic War, no plenums, let alone party congresses, were held, all cardinal issues were decided by the State Defense Committee (GKO).
Operational issues, as a rule, were considered solely by its chairman or individual members. It was also characteristic of the work of the State Defense Committee that even the most important problems of state life and military development were often solved by questioning. This approach often led to subjectivism, but in the current situation it turned out to be inevitable. It is known that during the war Stalin held a number of important party, state and military posts. He was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR, and headed the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command.
In the emergency conditions of the war, the result of strict centralization was the prompt and concrete solution of practical issues. Every day they appeared in dozens, hundreds, required coordination and clarification. The scope of the activities of the GKO can be judged at least by the fact that during its existence (from June 30, 1941 to September 4, 1945) it adopted about 10 thousand resolutions and decisions. About 2/3 of them in one way or another related to the economy and the organization of military production.
The decrees and orders of the State Defense Committee had the force of martial law and were subject to unquestioning implementation. The State Defense Committee directly supervised the creation of the military economy, its development, the strengthening of the Armed Forces, coordinated the needs of the active armies and navy with the capabilities of industry. This contributed to the most complete and expedient use of the military industry in the interests of victory. For the prompt resolution of issues under the State Defense Committee, special committees were created, commissions were formed.
The formation of the State Defense Committee and the Headquarters introduced appropriate changes into the practice of work of party and Soviet bodies that had developed in peacetime conditions. From the subordination of the Council of People's Commissars stood out everything that was directly connected with the conduct of the war: the military economy, and above all military production, strengthening and supplying the Armed Forces, and, finally, the leadership of military operations. The People's Commissariats of Defense, the Navy, the People's Commissariats of the Defense Industry and many other departments and departments that were directly related to the conduct of the war came under the jurisdiction of the State Defense Committee and the Headquarters. Under these conditions, the Council of People's Commissars is focusing its attention on those sectors that were not directly connected with military production, in particular, on the management of agricultural production.
An extraordinary form of party leadership was also introduced in the Armed Forces. It became the institute of military commissars. Simultaneously with the creation of the institution of military commissars, the Central Committee of the party reorganized the army and navy organs of political propaganda into political departments that directed both organizational-party and political-mass work. With the beginning of the war, the importance of military councils in the troops increased. In the first six months, 10 military councils of the fronts and about 30 military councils of the armies were created. A large number of experienced workers, major party and state leaders were introduced into their composition.
From the first days of the war, another emergency institution was also expanded - the institution of party organizers of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, as well as party organizers of the Central Committee of the Communist Parties of the Union republics, regional committees, and regional committees at the most important enterprises. Party organizers of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks were appointed to all military factories and enterprises of the defense industry, and to smaller ones - party organizers of the Central Committee of the parties of the union republics, regional committees, and regional committees. Party organizers were at the same time secretaries of factory party organizations, carried out their direct connection with the Central Committee of the party, local organizations. This system of emergency bodies of party leadership of the economy was supplemented by the political departments of machine and tractor stations and state farms created in November 1941. Thanks to all these measures, the national economy of our country was able to overcome the difficulties of military restructuring and, on the whole, provided the front with everything necessary. At the same time, the parallel existence of people's commissariats, local Soviet bodies and party structures for managing the national economy sometimes led to mistakes and incompetent decisions.
An important part of perestroika was the redistribution of party forces from rear organizations to military ones, as a result of which a significant number of communists went over to military work. Prominent party workers with extensive experience in organizational and mass political work were sent to direct military work in the army. As a result, in the initial period of the war, more than 500 secretaries of the Central Committee of the parties of the Union republics, regional, regional committees, city committees, and district committees were sent to the army and navy. All in all, during the Great Patriotic War, about 14,000 executives were mobilized into the Armed Forces.
One of the main tasks that had to be solved from the first days of the war was the fastest transfer of the national economy, the entire economy of the country, to a military footing. The main line of this restructuring was determined in the Directive of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR of June 29, 1941. Specific measures for the restructuring of the national economy began to be carried out from the first days of the war. On the second day of the war, a mobilization plan for the production of ammunition and cartridges was introduced. And on June 30, the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR approved a mobilization national economic plan for the third quarter of 1941. However, events at the front developed so unsuccessfully for us that this plan was not fulfilled. Given the current situation, on July 4, 1941, it was decided to urgently develop a new plan for the development of military production. The commission, headed by N. A. Voznesensky, First Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, was instructed to develop "a military-economic plan for ensuring the country's defense, bearing in mind the use of resources and enterprises located on the Volga, in Western Siberia and the Urals." In two weeks this commission developed a new plan for the fourth quarter of 1941 and for 1942 for the regions of the Volga region, the Urals, Western Siberia, Kazakhstan and Central Asia.
For the speedy deployment of a production base in the regions of the Volga region, the Urals, Western Siberia, Kazakhstan and Central Asia, it was recognized as necessary to transfer the industrial enterprises of the Narkommunitions, Narkomvooruzheniya, Narkomaviaprom, etc. to these areas.
Members of the Politburo, who were at the same time members of the State Defense Committee, carried out general management of the main branches of the military economy. N. A. Voznesensky dealt with the production of weapons and ammunition, G. M. Malenkov - aircraft and aircraft engines, V. M. Molotov - tanks, A. I. Mikoyan and others - food, fuel and clothing. A. I. Shakhurin - aviation industry, B. L. Vannikov - ammunition, I. F. Tevosyan - ferrous metallurgy, A. I. Efremov - machine-tool industry, V. V. Vakhrushev - coal, I. I. Sedin - oil .
The main link in the transition of the national economy to a military footing was the restructuring of industry. The transfer of industry to war footing meant a radical restructuring of the entire process of social production, a change in its direction and proportions. Almost all mechanical engineering was transferred to military rails. In November 1941, the People's Commissariat for General Engineering was transformed into the People's Commissariat for Mortar Weapons. In addition to the people's commissariats of the aviation industry, shipbuilding, armaments and ammunition, created before the war, two people's commissariats were formed at the beginning of the war - the tank and mortar industries. Thanks to this, all the decisive branches of the military industry received specialized centralized management. The production of jet mortars, which existed before the war only in prototypes, was started. Their manufacture was organized at the Moscow plant "Compressor". The front-line soldiers gave the name "Katyusha" to the first missile combat installation.
At the beginning of the war, a change was made to the distribution of food resources. Significant food supplies were lost during the hostilities. The available resources were directed primarily to supply the Red Army and provide for the population of industrial areas. The card system was introduced in the country.
Military restructuring required a centralized redistribution of the country's labor resources. If at the beginning of 1941 there were more than 31 million workers and employees in the country, then by the end of 1941 their number had decreased to 18.5 million people. In order to provide personnel for the military industry and related industries, it was necessary to rationally distribute the remaining labor resources and involve new sections of the population in production. For these purposes, already on June 30, 1941, the Committee for the Distribution of Labor was formed under the Council of People's Commissars.
At the same time, mandatory overtime work was introduced and vacations were cancelled. This made it possible to increase the utilization of production capacities by about a third without increasing the number of workers and employees. In July 1941, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR granted the right to the union and autonomous republics, the executive committees of the regional and regional Soviets, if necessary, to transfer workers and employees to work at other enterprises, regardless of their departmental affiliation and territorial location. This allowed local authorities to more quickly maneuver personnel in the interests of strengthening the defense industries.
Thanks to this, by the second half of 1941, it was possible to do a lot of work on the redistribution of personnel. As a result, by January 1942, more than 120 thousand people were additionally sent to the defense industry.
At the same time, the process of training workers through the system of labor reserves was actively carried out. In just two years, about 1,100,000 people were trained through this system for work in industry.
For the same purposes, in February 1942, the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR "On the mobilization of able-bodied urban population for work in production and construction" was adopted in February 1942, which provided for appropriate mobilization. In the very first days of the war, a decision was made to restructure the work of scientific institutions of the USSR Academy of Sciences, subordinating their activities to the interests of strengthening the state's defense capability. In the course of perestroika, the Academy of Sciences solved three interrelated tasks: 1) the development of scientific problems of defense importance; 2) scientific assistance to industry in improving and developing production; and 3) mobilization of the country's raw materials, replacement of scarce materials with local raw materials, organization of scientific research on the most pressing wartime issues.
Thus, the redistribution of the country's material, financial and labor resources, carried out from the very beginning of the war, played a decisive role in the restructuring of the entire national economy on a war footing. The change in economic proportions, the switching of all forces and means to serve the front laid a solid foundation for creating a well-coordinated economy in war conditions. During the restructuring of the national economy, the eastern industrial base became the main center of the war economy of the USSR, which was significantly expanded and strengthened with the outbreak of war.
In 1942, the production of military products in the Urals increased by more than 6 times compared to 1940, in Western Siberia - by 27, and in the Volga region - by 9 times. On the whole, during the war, industrial production in these regions more than tripled. This was a great military and economic victory achieved by the Soviet people during the difficult war years. It laid a solid foundation for the final victory over fascist Germany.
With the beginning of the war, in the conditions of an unfavorable development of military events, the fastest evacuation of the population, industrial enterprises, agricultural products, cultural and other state values from the front-line regions into the interior of the country was the most important political, military-economic problem facing the Soviet people. In the memoirs of A. I. Mikoyan, who was a member of the State Defense Committee during the war years, interesting information is provided on this subject: “Two days after the start of the war ... the question arose of the need to lead the evacuation from the front line. We have never had the idea of organizing an organ with such functions did not arise ... It became clear that the evacuation was taking on a huge scale. It was impossible to evacuate everything in a row, there was not enough time or transport. We had to literally choose on the go what was in the interests of the state to evacuate ... "(Military History Journal. 1988. No. 3. pp. 31–38). In the complex of these problems, the fastest removal and saving of millions of Soviet people from physical destruction was one of the priorities.
The accomplishment of such a difficult task required enormous efforts. The resolution of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR dated June 27, 1941 "On the procedure for the removal and placement of human contingents and valuable property" defined specific tasks and the order of evacuation. In addition to this, on July 5, 1941, the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR issued a decision on the procedure for evacuating the population in wartime and on the removal of workers and employees of evacuated enterprises. Plans were developed for the evacuation of people from the front line, indicating resettlement points, terms, order and sequence of removal.
By the decision of the government, the "Regulations on the evacuation point for the evacuation of the civilian population from the front line" was approved. The evacuation centers set up locally took care of the evacuated population, kept a record of the arrivals, etc. Departments for the evacuation of the population were created under the councils of people's commissars of the union republics, regional executive committees and regional executive committees. By decision of the government, first of all, children's institutions, women with children and the elderly were taken out. By January 1942, 10 million people were transported into the interior of the country by rail alone (World War II. General problems. Book 1, p. 74).
Great difficulties arose with the evacuation of the population in areas that were in the zone of military operations. These included the republics located in the Baltic states, the western regions of Ukraine, Moldova and Belarus, and Karelia.
At the beginning of the war, the evacuation of the population was also carried out from Moscow and Leningrad. The following facts testify to the scale of this work: in the autumn of 1941, 1.5 million people were evacuated from Moscow alone, and from January 22, 1942 to April 15, 1942, more than 55 thousand people were evacuated from Leningrad. This was the most difficult period of the evacuation. In general, during the war years, including the blockade period, about 2 million people were evacuated from Leningrad.
As a result of the successful evacuation, by the spring of 1942, up to 8 million evacuees were placed in the eastern regions of the country. By this time, the main wave of evacuation subsided.
However, this situation did not last long. In the summer of 1942, in connection with the breakthrough of the Nazi troops to the North Caucasus, the problem of mass evacuation of the population again arose with all its acuteness. This time the evacuation was carried out mainly from the central and southern regions of the European part of the USSR. In July 1942, the evacuation of the population from the Voronezh, Voroshilovgrad, Orel, Rostov, Stalingrad regions and the Stavropol and Krasnodar regions began.
The Soviet government showed great concern for the creation of material and living conditions for the evacuated population. In the state budget for the fourth quarter of 1941, 200 billion rubles were allocated for housing construction. In wartime conditions, these were large funds. Workers and employees of the evacuated enterprises were given a long-term loan for individual housing construction.
During the stay of the evacuees in new places, the local population surrounded them with care and attention. Families in need were given allowances, clothes and shoes were sold. In many agricultural artels, courses were organized to train evacuees in various agricultural professions.
The fraternal friendship of the Soviet peoples manifested itself during the evacuation, in the employment of the evacuated population, in the adoption of children whose parents had died. In less than a year of the war, by May 1, 1942, up to 2 thousand orphaned children were adopted by the working people of Kazakhstan alone. In Uzbekistan, a public movement to help evacuated children has developed widely. Thousands of children - Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians and other nationalities - were taken to Uzbek families for education. The evacuated children felt great in the families that sheltered them. They spoke not only Russian, but also learned to speak Uzbek. Orphanages were created at large agricultural artels, the maintenance of which was completely taken over by the collective farms.
As a result of the evacuation, millions of Soviet people were saved from physical extermination by the fascist invaders.
The evacuation of the population, industrial enterprises, agricultural products and cultural values in different economic regions took place at different times, depending on the situation on the fronts. The specific conditions of the military situation demanded that the evacuation be carried out twice: the first time - in the summer and autumn of 1941, the second time - in the summer and autumn of 1942. The evacuation of 1941 was the most massive.
Without dwelling in detail on the evacuation of industry, I would like to note only the following. During the war years, more than 2 thousand industrial enterprises were evacuated to the eastern regions. Almost 70% of them were located in the Urals, Western Siberia, Central Asia and Kazakhstan. The transfer of industry to the rear made it possible not only to preserve the main production assets, but also to gradually increase them, meeting the growing needs of the front.
The evacuation of the population, industry, food and raw materials carried out by the Soviet people during the Great Patriotic War, the export of cultural property to the deep rear contributed to the speedy restructuring of the entire national economy of the country on a war footing and the approach of victory. As the outstanding Soviet commander, Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov noted: "It was an incomparable labor epic, without which our victory over the strongest enemy would be absolutely impossible."
