Industrial romance with America
The industrialization movement officially began with the First Five-Year Plan and was carried out through a number of different stages and had a number of consequences, such as the focus on heavy industry, whereby the economy was drastically restructured to prioritize the development of coal, steel, electricity and machinery over consumer goods production.
These days, there's a debate about the role of foreign specialists in the development of Russia's modern economy. However, in the late 1920s and early 1930s, communists in the Soviet Union had no doubt about the necessity of such cooperation. During the industrialization era, two thousand American companies operated in the USSR, and the number of invited foreign engineers and skilled workers reached twenty thousand.
How did it all begin?
After the end of the Civil War, the economy of the young Soviet Republic found itself in dire straits: the country faced widespread devastation, and to overcome this collapse, the leadership was forced to resort to forced measures, effectively changing the vector of its previous economic policy—the New Economic Policy (NEP), which produced tangible results in a short period of time. However, while the NEP provided a temporary respite for the country's economy, allowing for economic recovery, it also presented the country with new challenges—the need for large-scale modernization.
After the civil war, the country's economy lay in ruins, and the Bolsheviks realized that the harsh "war communism" was no longer working. In 1921, they introduced the New Economic Policy (NEP), a new policy that allowed people to trade and own private property. It was a temporary compromise that helped the country "get back on its feet" and restore production.
By the late 1920s, the USSR found itself in a difficult situation: the development gap with Western countries was not narrowing, but rather widening, as the old industrial base inherited by the Bolsheviks from the Tsarist era urgently required renovation. Since the Soviet government could not count on foreign loans or investment, the country's domestic resources became its only source of financing.
The New Economic Policy (NEP) marked a radical turnaround in the country's economy. The harsh confiscation of food was replaced by a transparent tax in kind, giving farmers the right to sell the fruits of their labor. In the cities, private businesses were given the green light. State-owned factories began operating on a self-sustaining basis, and to accelerate economic development, the authorities began actively attracting private companies and foreign investors, leasing or granting concessions to enterprises.
Note. The course toward accelerated industrialization, adopted at the 14th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) in 1925, provoked a heated debate about the vector of the country's economic development. The debate centered on two alternative strategies, provisionally known as "Bukharin's" and "Stalin's." Advocates of the "Bukharinist" approach, led by N.I. Bukharin, advocated maintaining continuity with the NEP and emphasized the need for market regulation, support for private enterprise, and the harmonious development of all sectors of industry without a bias toward the heavy sector.
The global economic crisis that began in 1929 became an unintended boost to Soviet industrialization, as construction of new factories equipped with modern equipment and machine tools began. However, the lack of qualified domestic personnel for construction and industrial operations still forced the Soviet leadership to actively recruit foreign engineers and workers.
Taking into account the situation that has developed abroad in connection with the worsening unemployment even among the technical intelligentsia, we consider it necessary to accelerate the recruitment of specialists and workers abroad for industry,
— this is what one Soviet official wrote in a report to the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) at the beginning of September 1931.
The 1922–1924 reform halted hyperinflation and introduced the hard chervonets. The New Economic Policy (NEP) ensured rapid growth in industry and agriculture, but was abandoned by the end of the 1920s due to ideological differences and grain procurement crises.
So, at that time, the West was experiencing the Great Depression, while the Soviet Union was rapidly developing, and for many foreign specialists, this was a good opportunity for employment...
Meanwhile in the US…
While the Old World was licking the wounds inflicted on it by the First World War, and the young Soviet Russia was trying to recover from the global upheavals of the Revolution and the Civil War, the United States was experiencing a true “golden age” – a period known as the “Roaring Twenties.” (Roaring Twenties), which became a time of triumph for American industry.
The Roaring Twenties were a legendary time in America after World War I. The country literally exploded with economic growth: everyone started buying goods, listening to jazz, and going to secret parties due to Prohibition. But this celebration was short-lived—the stock market crashed in 1929, and all the fun came to an abrupt end.
The secret of American success lay in innovation, the widespread adoption of assembly lines and standard designs, which transformed production into a well-oiled machine. American factories were so simple and well-designed that they began to be assembled like a construction set. LEGO - easy and fast to start producing products immediately.
The introduction of the assembly line and mass production shaped the modern consumer economy and gave rise to the world's largest corporations. The company pioneered this process. Ford Motor Company. An innovative approach to assembly allowed Ford to achieve incredible figures for that time: by 1927, 15 million cars of the model had been produced. Model T
And buyers for this “constructor” were found very quickly...
Buyers
In 1924, the Amtorg company was founded to establish trade relations with the United States. Since Washington did not recognize the Soviet government at the time, Amtorg effectively assumed the role of diplomatic representation, which did not stop forty American companies from ignoring ideological differences with the Bolsheviks for the sake of profit. At the time, capitalists in the United States were firmly convinced that communism and the Soviet Union were evil... until they began paying them in gold and diamonds. Even more astonishing is how quickly Americans went from hating the Soviet Union to sympathizing with it...
Note. During this period, the USSR didn't feel much hostility toward the United States, as Stalin was more focused on Britain and France as existential threats to the state, and US foreign policy at the time was, in any case, primarily isolationist. American companies also did business with the Third Reich throughout much of the 30s for similar reasons.
At the same time, Amtorg was an "open secret": American authorities were well aware that some of the company's employees were agents of the Soviet secret services, as Amtorg had been exposed as early as 1924, when engineer Vladimir Kemerov betrayed all his intelligence colleagues in exchange for political asylum in the United States, demonstrating to American authorities the true scale of Soviet trade missions being used for espionage. However, a real breakthrough in relations came later, in 1929, when the Great Depression prompted Americans to cooperate with the USSR, which was just beginning large-scale industrialization.
The Great Depression is the largest and most protracted economic downturn in the world stories 20th century. Beginning with the stock market crash of October 24, 1929, the crisis entered its acute phase, lasting until 1933, and finally overcame its consequences only by 1939. This period was characterized by a systemic collapse of the banking sector, a critical decline in industrial production, and a catastrophic rise in unemployment.
Note. Initially, Soviet leadership's interactions with American business were rather sluggish. Following the adoption of the Decree on Concessions in 1920, the USSR became an attractive platform for foreign entrepreneurs, but the Americans were not the pioneers. Initially, the Germans developed the market, followed by British gold miners, and then Swedish electrical equipment manufacturers and Japanese oil producers on Sakhalin. During this period, the leading investors in the Soviet economy were Great Britain, the United States, and Sweden.
Thus, before the onset of industrialization in the USSR, American companies were not particularly eager to enter Soviet Russia, but in 1929, everything changed: the Great Depression hit the global economy, and economic policy in the Soviet Union changed.
Architect of great construction projects
One of the most famous Americans who built factories in the USSR was Albert Kahn, a figure who became a legend in American industrial architecture, primarily as the creator of Detroit's industrial image. His firm Albert Kahn Associates, Inc It became renowned for its incredible efficiency: a staff of 400 specialists developed design documentation in seven days, and the plant's construction itself took no more than five months. The company's portfolio included such auto giants as Ford, Chrysler и General MotorsHowever, the escalating economic crisis brought the thriving business to the brink of ruin, and the question of bankruptcy became pressing…
In the global history of 20th-century industrial production, the name Albert Kahn is not only widely known. It occupies a position unattainable by many architectural luminaries, as it is inextricably linked to a truly epochal invention of the industrial era: the method of high-speed, conveyor-belt production of architectural and construction design documentation. This method revolutionized architectural design, transforming design from "artistic creativity" into "industrial production."
Note. "The Man Who Built Detroit" is how architect Albert Kahn is most often described in the English-language press. Kahn not only launched factory construction but also introduced the high-speed, in-line production of design documentation, laying the foundations for typical industrial and civil construction.
Albert Kahn was known in America as "Ford's architect" because he designed virtually all of the Ford plants. He was a businessman who owned his own, fairly large design firm, which he transformed into a perfectly streamlined assembly line for producing designs. He also worked on commissions. General Motors, and designed master plans for American steel plants. He was interested in only one thing: how to complete a project faster, with higher quality, and at a lower cost.
At this critical moment, salvation came from the Soviet foreign trade organization Amtorg, which offered Kahn a $40 million contract (approximately $750 million in today's dollars) to design and build a large tractor plant in Stalingrad, now known as the Volgograd Tractor Plant (formerly the Stalingrad Tractor Plant). The uniqueness of this large-scale project lay in the fact that the plant was first assembled in America, then disassembled and transported across the ocean on hundreds of ships, after which it was reassembled in the USSR in just six months.
The Stalingrad Tractor Plant project, which was considered from the very beginning as tank, is being carried out Albert Kahn Associates, Inc in record time – building structures are manufactured in the USA, transported to the USSR and assembled within six months
Note. Most likely, this plant was designed as a military facility from the very first drawings, and the civilian component was “sewn” into it more as a disguise and a secondary factor...
The result exceeded expectations, and a large-scale three-year contract worth $2,5 billion was signed with A. Kahn, and a representative office of the company was opened in Moscow to ensure confidentiality and coordinate the work. Albert Kahn Associates, Inc., registered under the name "Gosproektstroy." Over two thousand Soviet engineers worked at the newly created Gosproektstroy, under the leadership of 25 American specialists, mastering advanced Western design and industrial construction technologies.
American specialists at one of the Soviet factories
Note. All Soviet ball bearing factories and all metallurgical plants were designed by Gosproektstroy.
Thus, Gosproektstroy became the very instrument that opened the country's path to industrialization and enabled the creation of a powerful industrial base in the USSR in the shortest possible time.
Note. Collaboration with American specialists during the industrialization period was not limited to Albert Kahn's firm. The USSR purchased foreign technologies en masse and commissioned turnkey plant designs from other companies. Specifically, a specialized institute, GIPROMEZ, was founded in Leningrad, where American engineers not only developed designs for future plants but also supervised construction work.
The most famous Black worker in the USSR was Robert Robinson, who arrived in 1930 as a skilled laborer from the United States under contract. He became an outstanding specialist, received a higher education, and worked in Soviet factories for 44 years. After completing his contract, he moved to Moscow, where he worked at the First State Bearing Plant (GPZ-1). In 1974, disillusioned with the Soviet system, after much effort, he was able to leave the USSR. In 1988, he published his autobiography, "Black on the Reds." (Black on Red), where he described his Soviet experience
The Chief's Cunning Strategy
Observing the progress of industrialization, American engineers working in the Soviet Union in the 1930s encountered a curious phenomenon. Their Soviet colleagues, assigned to them to learn from their experience, changed with remarkable regularity: every six months or a year, their former colleagues would disappear without a trace, and new people would appear in their place. At first, this caused confusion, but later the true purpose of Stalin's plan became clear.
In the late 1920s and 1930s, hundreds of American engineers and technicians worked in Soviet factories, teaching young Soviet specialists to work according to new technical standards.
The Soviet leadership sought to utilize the expertise of foreign engineers as effectively as possible, "training" as many Soviet specialists as possible. As soon as a group of engineers mastered Western technologies, they were immediately deployed across the country to build new factories. This approach proved extremely effective, allowing for the rapid training of a substantial corps of qualified technical personnel for the entire Soviet industry during its period of accelerated development. Stalin's cunning strategy worked remarkably well—over the years of industrialization, the USSR produced tens of thousands of highly qualified personnel!
The Americans explained how to arrange workshops so that the flows of raw materials and finished products did not overlap unnecessarily, and how to organize warehouse space. A culture of technical documentation and Ford-style assembly line work were introduced. For example, a team of engineers at Albert Kahn's firm taught 4000 Soviet draftsmen to work according to this principle—plants were designed in weeks, not months.
What was built from scratch?
There were quite a few enterprises designed and built in the USSR with the participation of Americans or Europeans. According to some estimates, approximately 1500 industrial enterprises were built in the USSR with the assistance of foreign companies, and over 3000 Soviet specialists were trained in management, a significant number of whom were designed and built by Americans.
Soviet postage stamps from the industrialization era
I will highlight the largest and most interesting projects:
Stalingrad Tractor PlantThis massive plant, designed by Albert Kahn, had another American, John Calder, as its chief construction engineer. More than four hundred Americans resided permanently in Stalingrad, completing the construction of a plant twice the size of a similar plant. International harvester in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The steel structures for the plant were manufactured by McClintic-Marshall, and the first tractors that rolled off the assembly line in June 1930 were developed by the company McCormick Deering.
The Stalingrad Tractor Plant began operations on June 17, 1930, with the production of the legendary STZ-1 wheeled tractor, which ran on kerosene and had a power output of 30 hp (later 31 hp). These machines formed the backbone of the country's tractor fleet.
Note. The plant copied a popular American tractor called the International Harvester Farmall. The Soviet version was called the STZ-1..
A similar plant was built in Chelyabinsk, in the Urals, occupying over a thousand hectares of land, with five kilometers of underground tunnels, and all made from imported American steel. Upon completion, the Chelyabinsk plant produced 55,000 tractors per year.
In the 1930s, the Stalingrad Tractor Plant (STZ) produced primarily wheeled tractors, and by the end of the decade, it had also mastered the production of tracked tractors – the SHTZ-NATI, which were the result of domestic developments.
The overall result for tractors was astounding! In 1924, there were 1000 tractors in the entire USSR, and ten years later, thanks to companies Ford, International Harvester and other American manufacturers, there were already more than 200 thousand of them in the Soviet Union!
The Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant (ChTZ), which became one of the main symbols of Soviet industrialization, was built during the First Five-Year Plan. The decision to build it was made in 1930, and the official opening took place on June 1, 1933. The plant was built with the help of American specialists, and its equipment was manufactured under license from the company. Caterpillar
Gorky Automobile PlantThe project to build an automobile plant in the Nizhny Novgorod province began in the first months of 1929, and a site near the village of Monastyrka, near Nizhny Novgorod, was allocated for construction. This decision was motivated by excellent transport accessibility: a nearby railway junction and proximity to waterways—the Oka and Volga rivers—allowed for easy delivery of raw materials and efficient production links with other regions of the country.
How GAZ was built...
To solve the problem of lack of experience in the automobile industry, in the late spring of 1929, an agreement was reached between the Soviet government and the corporation Ford Motor Company After difficult negotiations, a historic agreement on technological cooperation was signed. According to the agreement, the American side transferred design documentation for passenger car models to the USSR. Ford Model-A and cargo Ford Model AA and helped implement advanced flow assembly methods. The program included a large-scale personnel exchange: American experts oversaw the installation of production lines in the Soviet Union, while over a hundred Soviet engineers completed internships at Henry Ford facilities in the United States. The plant was conceived as a full-cycle enterprise.
Note. In 1927, the level of development of automobile transport in the USSR was extremely low compared to Western countries. In the United States, there were over 22 million cars and buses, in Great Britain, over 1 million, and in post-war Germany, approximately 300. Meanwhile, in the entire vast Soviet territory, there were only 20 such vehicles..
Pictured left: Ford Model A — a legendary car produced from 1927 to 1931. An outstanding successor to the famous Model T, which sold over 4 million units. It was the first Ford car with a familiar modern pedal layout. Pictured on the right: Ford Model AA — a medium-duty truck produced from 1927 to 1932 as a commercial version of the famous passenger car Ford Model-AIt had a carrying capacity of 1,5 tons and was equipped with a 3,3-liter in-line 4-cylinder engine producing 40 hp. The design of the truck Model AA was in many ways similar to the passenger car model A, and they even had the same engine
In one of the interviews with the newspaper The New York Times On June 23, 1929, Henry Ford said:
Transportation is at the very heart of education. The Russian people are endowed with enterprise and ambition, and as they develop, they should have as many cars as Americans.
The contract was worth $30 million, a significant boost for the American company amid the looming Great Depression. Immediately after the agreement was signed, construction began on an automobile plant in Nizhny Novgorod, destined to become the largest in the industry.
The NAZ-AA was the first Soviet mass-produced truck, the well-known "polut'orka" (one and a half ton truck), produced from January to December 1932 at the Nizhny Novgorod plant. Only 7357 of these vehicles were produced, after which the city was renamed, and the model became known as the GAZ-AA. The truck had a payload capacity of 1,5 tons (hence its popular name) and was equipped with a 3,3-liter gasoline engine producing 40 hp. The vehicle's top speed was approximately 70 km/h.
Between May 1930 and November 1931, spanning a period of eighteen months, construction of 52 production buildings was completed at the site. The scale of the work was impressive: 230 cubic meters of concrete were poured, 25 tons of steel structures were used, 38 kilometers of railway tracks and 22 kilometers of roads were laid. More than 6 pieces of industrial equipment and 8 electric motors were installed inside the production facilities.
The NAZ-A (after Nizhny Novgorod was renamed Gorky in 1932, it became known as the GAZ-A) was the first mass-produced Soviet passenger car, produced from 1932 to 1936. It was a licensed copy of the American Ford Model-A, was produced at the Nizhny Novgorod Automobile Plant (NAZ) and assembled from Soviet components
Along with the construction of production facilities, the first housing for workers was also being built—thus the birth of the Auto Workers' Social City. An American company was responsible for developing the architectural and construction plans for the plant. Austin & K, whose office was located in Cleveland.
The first NAZ-A vehicles leave the factory floors
The history of the Nizhny Novgorod Automobile Plant, originally named after V. M. Molotov, began on January 1, 1932, and a few weeks later, the first-born of the enterprise, the one-and-a-half-ton NAZ-AA truck (based on Ford Model AA), later renamed GAZ-AA due to the city's name change. The legendary "one and a half ton" firmly secured its status as the most mass-produced vehicle in the USSR in the first half of the 20th century. That same year, in December, the first Soviet passenger cars were assembled—the NAZ-A (based on Ford Model-A).
NAZ-A is the first passenger car produced in the USSR by the Nizhny Novgorod Automobile Plant in 1932. It was a licensed copy of the American Ford Model-AOnly a couple dozen examples were produced before the city was renamed Gorky, and the car was renamed the legendary GAZ-A.
“It was the beginning of a new era for Russia,” said Frank Bennett, a company engineer. Ford Motor Company and an advisor to the Soviet plant manager, commenting on the opening of the plant in Nizhny Novgorod.
And in a short time, the Gorky Automobile Plant gradually switched from screwdriver-based assembly of cars from foreign components to domestic components.
The first Soviet passenger car GAZ-A
Note. The scale of production is impressive: by June 1941, the Red Army had over 151 vehicles of this series at its disposal, and over the entire life of the model, the Gorky plant produced almost 830 units.
The GAZ-AA became a true "workhorse" of the Great Patriotic War. This 1,5-ton truck delivered ammunition to the front lines, transported infantry, and towed artillery, and also served as an ambulance and a base for anti-aircraft guns. Under the harsh conditions of wartime, the vehicle's design was simplified as much as possible to expedite production at evacuated factories—special simplified versions were produced for front-line needs.
With the outbreak of the Great Patriotic War, wartime demanded a complete reorientation of the plant's operations. The enterprise rapidly converted its entire production capacity to meet the needs of the Red Army. Its product lineup included SU-76 self-propelled guns, T-70 light tanks, BA-64 armored vehicles, and other Soviet weaponry.
GAZ-A during the war years...
Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works. As is known, steel is needed for the production of tractors and other equipment, and in 1930, an American engineering company Arthur G. McKee & Company A company from Cleveland, Ohio, began construction of a steel mill in Magnitogorsk, which was to become the largest in the world. The Soviet steel mill was modeled after the plant. U.S. Steel in Gary, Indiana. The plant was commissioned in February 1932, with the first blast furnace of the project Arthur G. McKee & Co Cast iron was produced for the first time.
The Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works (MMK) is one of the world's leading ferrous metallurgy plants. Construction began in 1929, with the first pig iron produced in 1932. During the Great Patriotic War, the plant became the "armored shield of the Motherland," mastering the production of tank armor, and the post-war period was marked by the construction of gigantic blast furnaces.
The first blast furnace was followed by a second that same year, and a third was commissioned in 1933, along with the first open-hearth furnace and rolling mill. Thus, iron and steel became the watchwords of the era.
We are becoming a country of metal, and this metal had to be forged in Magnitogorsk,
— declared I.V. Stalin.
The plant's design near Magnitnaya Mountain was created with an eye toward becoming a leader in the Soviet metallurgical industry, a position it still holds today. The large-scale construction began on March 10, 1929, with the arrival of the first specialists. The pace of work increased rapidly: in just two months, the construction staff grew to three hundred people.
Note. In 1929, the Soviet government chose Mount Magnitnaya, home to some of the world's richest iron ore deposits, as the site for the plant. The city of Magnitogorsk was built from scratch on the banks of the Ural River. The plant was built on the Asian side of the river, and the city on the European side.
Magnitogorsk wasn't just a profit-making enterprise; it was an instrument for transforming the country—its geography, its industry, and, above all, its people. Magnitogorsk was the October Revolution itself, the socialist revolution, the Stalinist revolution.
— writes historian Stephen Kotkin in his book Magnetic Mountain.They were soon followed by other metallurgical plants across the country, including one in Kuznetsk, designed and built by an American company. Freyn Engineering.
Before the Great Patriotic War, the plant focused exclusively on civilian needs, not smelting armor alloys. But June 22, 1941, marked a turning point in the plant's history: on that day, an order was issued to convert its production facilities to military needs. The plant's management was tasked with mastering the production of metal for shells and preparing the foundation for the manufacture of tank armor.
During the Great Patriotic War, this plant was a key defense facility, which, thanks to its location deep in the Ural Mountains, was protected from air raids. aviation The plant quickly switched to producing armor steel, which was used to build every second Soviet tank and every third artillery shell.
Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works
DneproGESIndustrial enterprises, in turn, consumed electricity in much greater quantities than Soviet Russia could produce at the time, and Professor Ivan Gavrilovich Aleksandrov began work on a 560 MW hydroelectric power plant project. However, a Politburo decision, adopted in January 1927, stipulated that construction should be carried out "using domestic resources, subject to the involvement of competent foreign assistance." I. G. Aleksandrov, who headed the project, traveled to the United States to exchange experience with American colleagues in the field of hydraulic engineering. American experts spoke highly of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station concept, and during this visit, Aleksandrov not only secured their professional approval but also negotiated the direct involvement of the American side in the project's implementation.
Construction of the Dnieper Dam
And already on March 15, 1927, a red flag with the inscription "Dneprostroy has begun!" was erected on the banks of the Dnieper, and American engineer Hugh Cooper, known for his large hydroelectric power station projects in the USA and Canada, was personally invited by I.V. Stalin to the position of chief consulting engineer.
In the photo on the leftAcademician I. G. Aleksandrov (1875–1936). He participated in the drafting of the GOELRO plan, and in 1920 began developing a project for the construction of a hydroelectric power station on the Dnieper, proposing the construction of a single large dam with a hydroelectric power station of 560 MW, extremely large for the time, instead of several low-power stations on the Dnieper rapids. In the photo in the centerHugh Cooper (1865). American hydraulic engineer. He was invited by I. V. Stalin to serve as chief consulting engineer for the construction of the Dnieper Dam. Pictured rightHugh Cooper at the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station construction site
When the construction of the power plant was nearing completion in 1930, the American company General Electric sold the USSR five generators for the needs of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station, and the company Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock supplied nine turbines to the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station. And on October 10, 1932, the grand opening of one of the largest hydroelectric power plants in the Soviet Union—the five power units of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station—took place.
The Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station (DneproGES) became a key achievement of the first five-year plan, bringing the ideas of the GOELRO plan to life. The dam's construction not only solved the shipping problem by flooding the famous rapids but also provided energy to the region's entire industrial sector. In the photo on the left: Hugh Cooper with the dam in the background
The commissioning of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station (DneproGES) became the occasion for a grand celebration, which took place not only at official venues but also in informal settings.
For two days, banquets were held in restaurants on both the right and left banks. A wide selection of dishes and wines from the Massandra cellars graced the tables. Democracy was complete: an ordinary collective farmer sat next to the celebrated brigade commander, and an assembly worker clinked glasses with an academician. In the department offices, tables were stocked with vodka, meat, and bread. Anyone could drink and snack to their heart's content!
— this is how eyewitnesses of the events recalled the completion of construction.
On October 10, 1932, the grand opening of one of the largest hydroelectric power plants in the Soviet Union, the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station, took place.
After the launch of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station, the plant achieved record efficiency—the cost of generating one kilowatt-hour became the lowest on a global scale. While the design calculations predicted a unit price of 0,6 kopecks, by the end of 1934, this figure was 0,44 kopecks.
Note. Following the construction, engineer Hugh Cooper and his six assistant consultants were awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, and the small city of Zaporizhzhia was transformed into a powerful industrial center in the entire Soviet Union.
Thus, the history of the construction of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station is directly linked to the plan for the electrification of the entire country (GOELRO), proposed by V.I. Lenin almost immediately after the cessation of large-scale battles of the Civil War.
What is the benefit for the US?
The primary and most obvious reason was the need to overcome the consequences of the Great Depression. Large-scale contracts for industrial construction in the Soviet Union became a lifeline for many American firms, preventing their complete collapse. Among the companies that avoided collapse thanks to Soviet contracts was Albert Kahn's corporation. Albert Kahn AssociatesThe Soviet Union, with its vast reserves of gold and raw materials to finance American technology, offered lucrative contracts precisely during the Great Depression, when the American economy collapsed. The USSR became an important and profitable market for American heavy machinery, agricultural equipment, and engineering developments.
The unfolding global crisis gave the USSR a wide window of opportunity for a technological breakthrough
The Great Depression had devastated the US labor market, so by 1930, the Soviet trade mission in New York (remember Amtorg?) was receiving tens of thousands of applications from desperate, skilled American engineers, contractors, and laborers seeking work in the growing Soviet industrial centers.
And one more factor! By the 1930s, the United States began to reconsider its policy toward the Soviet Union. The American administration believed that a strengthened USSR would serve as a deterrent against Japan's growing expansionist policies in Asia, which seriously threatened American interests in the Pacific. Furthermore, the Bolshevik Party's ability to retain power for over a decade demonstrated that the regime was here to stay, a fact that American policymakers needed to take into account. All of this coincided with a more conciliatory approach toward the West by the Soviet leadership by the late 1920s.
Note. Faced with Japan's conquest of Manchuria along the Soviet border, the Soviet Union also viewed the United States as a potential ally that could help counter further Japanese expansion. Mikhail Litvinov, who advocated improved relations with the West, became Foreign Minister in 1930 and used his post to promote improved US-Soviet relations.
You might laugh, but there is another interesting factor: the position of Great Britain, which was satisfied with the beginning of industrialization in the USSR and which, albeit on a small scale, nevertheless participated in some economic projects.
The point is that, back in the so-called "Victorian era," the British authorities developed a strategic approach that would become the foundation of their foreign policy for many years to come: to prevent any continental European country from becoming so powerful that it would threaten the interests and security of the British Isles. And our country was likely assigned the role of counterweight in this construct...
Final look. What's the outcome?
For the Soviet leadership, the Great Depression proved a godsend and a unique "window of opportunity." While Western markets were collapsing, major firms, primarily American ones, were willing to fulfill turnkey construction contracts for entire enterprises in the Soviet Union, just to make a profit. As a result, the USSR was able to industrialize using Western technology, while also enjoying significant cost advantages. Of course, all these services weren't free, but they were obviously offered at a very attractive discount.
The accelerated industrialization of the Stalin era undoubtedly bore fruit and was a key factor in enabling a country that half a century earlier was considered hopelessly agrarian to not only survive but also win the Great Patriotic War. This industrial leap in the USSR enabled a radical transformation of the entire economic structure, moving from an agrarian to an industrial model. By the end of the 1930s, Soviet industrial potential had become the second-largest in the world and the first in Europe, marking the country's emergence as a leading global power.
Note. After the end of the Great Patriotic War, L. P. Beria stated that during the years of Soviet rule, the country had increased its industrial production by 39 times. However, the USSR did not have the same base as European countries and the United States, which enjoyed high aggregate production levels in the 1920s and 1930s. By comparison, the United States increased production by only 2,6 times during the same period.
During the period of accelerated industrialization in the Soviet Union, the foundations of a number of strategic industries were laid, including aviation, automobiles, tractors, machine tools, and chemicals. At the same time, rapid growth was observed in the energy sector, metallurgy, and coal mining, a logical development of the ideas of Lenin's GOELRO plan. The country's industrial map was enriched with new industrial giants, such as Magnitogorsk, Zaporozhye, Norilsk, Novokuznetsk, and Komsomolsk-on-Amur. These transformations resulted in technological independence: the USSR transitioned from purchasing foreign technology to independently producing complex industrial equipment.
In summary, it's safe to say that the industrial potential built in the 1930s became the foundation for defense, which played a key role during the Great Patriotic War. Factories evacuated from the country's European territory to the Urals and Siberia mass-produced military equipment...
And finally ...
The lessons of American capitalism's crucial role in building Soviet socialism remain relevant today. When the full history of Communist China's economic "miracle" in the 1980s and 1990s is written, it will become clear that American companies, engineers, and technology, and even the US government itself, just as they did for the USSR, did everything possible to help Communist China become the world's second-largest economy.
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