USSR debts: how Russia returned them
Today, when from the lips of some politicians and leaders of post-Soviet countries, from time to time, statements are made about their merciless economic exploitation as part of the USSR, and on the basis of these demarches, it is concluded that the Russian Federation, which is the successor to the Union, needs something again raise the topic of real debts of the Soviet Union. And especially of how and when Russia gave them.
Any person building an idea of the Soviet period stories our country, on acquaintance with concrete and reliable data about that time, there must certainly be bewilderment that a state with a powerful and self-sufficient complex of the national economy in general was in debtor almost half of the world. Moreover, he managed to get into this hole so deeply that Russia had to pay off his obligations almost to the present moment. Here, "thank" is, of course, the last head of the USSR, Mikhail Gorbachev, as well as his team of "reformers".
In itself, the presence of external debt is normal for any state. The only question is its volume. Soviet foreign debt began to grow sharply (300% immediately) since the end of 1984. In absolute terms, this was an increase in debt from 5 to 15 billion dollars. But by 1989, it was already estimated at 50 billion, and by the time when Gorbachev and his relatives brought the country to a pen, to collapse and collapse, the debt reached 100 billion!
Categories of loan commitments
At the same time, all credit liabilities, hanging a heavy burden on the USSR, were clearly divided into three categories. These are debts to the Paris Club, that is, the richest and most influential countries of the Western world, such as the USA, Britain, France, Germany, Austria, Japan and others. These are debts to other states: UAE, Kuwait, Turkey. Finally, these are the amounts of credit debt that were formed as a result of “fruitful cooperation” with our dear “allies and partners” in the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, which after 1991, quickly “reforging” into capitalists, remembered everything to the last penny.
It turned out to be, perhaps, the most offensive: the financial imbalance, which Moscow subsequently had to pay for, arose, for the most part, due to the fact that it conducted trade with the CMEA countries exclusively in their favor. The calculations were not in freely convertible currency (in which later they had to repay debts). The main thing is weapon, energy, industrial equipment entered the countries of the socialist camp at low prices, and consumer goods received from them in return were priced at the highest rates. Such a "friendship of peoples" ended up sideways ...
One cannot fail to mention the fact that Gorbachev simultaneously thought of recognizing part of the debts of the Russian Empire (for example, to Great Britain), about which his predecessors did not want to listen. In a word, the “inheritance” of Russia got something else. However, not only Russia. Indeed, in the USSR, as we recall, 15 republics were included. In accordance with the intergovernmental memorandum signed at the end of October 1991, and then approved a month later by the corresponding official communiqué, all of his “children” had to repay the debt of the “peace-rested” Soviet Union. On this occasion, even before the collapse of the country, an official summit was held in Moscow, the purpose of which was precisely the settlement of the "credit issue".
In this event, in addition to representatives of the seven most significant creditor countries, delegations from most of the Union republics also took part. Initially, only Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Uzbekistan took the position “to whom I owe, I forgive everyone”. As a result of negotiations, the following solution was worked out: both the debts of the Soviet Union itself and all its assets are transferred in equal proportions to all independent states formed after its collapse. Russia owed 61,3%, Ukraine 16,3%, Belarus 4,1%, and so on. The problem was that such, seemingly the most logical solution, did not suit anyone.
Creditors did not want to receive their hard-earned money from many small debtors, many of whom had nothing to take. And, apparently, the goal was to put the maximum (preferably - completely unbearable) burden on the financial system of Russia from the very beginning. One way or another, but in the end it was our country that proposed to shoulder the entire burden of USSR debt obligations - in exchange for all its assets located abroad, without exception. With such a tempting offer, everyone agreed, except Kiev. The Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada flatly refused to ratify the “zero option” twice. By the way, Viktor Yanukovych was also his ardent opponent, whom our country eventually sheltered after the shameful flight from its own country. The question remains open to this day ...
And Russia has distributed debts. First of all, in 2006 they settled with the Paris Club, saving $ 7,7 million on interest. Kuwait was repaid a debt of $ 1,1 billion ten years later, with more than 600 million dollars in interest having been repaid, not by money, but by domestic products. More than 400 million Swiss francs were returned to China in 2015. The last debt of the USSR, to Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the amount of 125 million dollars, inherited from Yugoslavia, was “closed” by Russia on August 8, 2017.
Thus, the financial obligations of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics were fully repaid by our country. It is a pity that this cannot be said in any way about the repayment of amounts by foreign states to Russia itself, is the successor of the Soviet Union. The logic is generally interesting: if payments on Soviet debts needed to be claimed, then they immediately remembered the "succession", but as soon as it came to their own payments, they immediately declared that there was no one to pay, it seemed, because the USSR did not exist.
- Alexander Kharaluzhny
- Wikipedia / USSR Currency
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