Page 49 - The Chief Culprit

26 y e Chief Culprit

producing tanks. During the course of the war, this factory was called Tankograd. It built not
only the medium T-34 tanks, but also the heavy IS and KV classes.
Not far away, in Sverdlovsk, a third gigantic factory was built—Uralmash. is factory
is among the top ten engineering factories in the world. In order to supply these giants in the
Urals, the net of steel-casting factories was greatly expanded. A city of metallurgists—Magni-
togorsk—was built, as well as a huge plant, the main output of which was steel armor.
e Urals were not at all the only center of tank building. In Stalingrad, a tractor fac-
tory was built, which also on the surface was designed for producing tractors but in reality
was for producing tanks. At the same time, automobile, motor, aviation, and artillery facto-
ries were being erected. e most powerful aviation factory in the world was built in the Far
East. In order to service the factory, the city Komsomolsk-na-Amure was built. is city was
a complement to the factory. Both the factory and the city were built according to American
designs and furnished with the most modern American equipment. e scope of construc-
tion in Komsomolsk astounded even the American engineers, who were there to install the
equipment.
Modern factories were built in the Soviet Union, but the lives of the people were not at
all improving as a result. e most ordinary pots and pans, rubber boots, plates, the simplest
furniture, cheapest clothing, nails, and matches—all these became scarce. Huge lines formed
outside the stores. Stalin was paying for industrialization with his people’s standard of living,
letting it drop very low.
Stalin had one more ace: spies. e West supplied Stalin with the most contemporary
industrial equipment, and sold licenses for production of the newest models of weapons and
military technology. But all that could not be obtained by legal means was stolen by Stalin’s
spies. Stalin was generous with his gold when it came to spying.
In order to raise the productivity of his scientists and engineers, Stalin imprisoned en-
tire collectives of engineers, accusing them of being spies. Prominent aviation, tank, and ar-
tillery engineers found themselves behind bars. Among them was S. O. Korolev—the future
inventor of the first artificial satellite to orbit Earth, N. N. Polikarpov, A. N. Tupolev, R. L.
Bartini, V. M. Myasishev, V. M. Petlyakov, and thousands of others. e task set before them
was simple: create the best bomber (tank, cannon, engine, and submarine) in the world and
you will receive freedom; fail and you will go to Dal’stroy to extract gold; the inmates there
do not live too long. Imprisoned engineers did not have to be paid millions for their work,
they did not need good houses or apartments, and there was no need to send them to resorts
by the warm sea: without all this, they were still very interested in creating the best weapons
in the world on very short deadlines. ese were talented people; on top of talent, Stalin’s
spies supplied everything that was created by the best minds in the world. Every imprisoned
engineer had before him the best American, German, British, and other designs in the given
field. He could choose the best, and based on it create something even more remarkable.
Immediately after the Communists seized power, the land was divided among the peas-
ants. Land was divided rather fairly—according to the number of mouths to feed, meaning
the size of area a family received depended on the number of its members. Millions of Russian
peasants dreamed for centuries of receiving land. Now their dreams had finally come true, but
resulted in a widespread famine across the land. e cause for this was that the Communists
gave people the land, but demanded everything the peasants could grow to be given back to
the government. e land is yours, but all that you can grow on it is not yours.