RUSSIA: The Other Soviet Front

Last week TIME’S London Bureau cabled:

“Russian UNO delegates have been saying in private that anyone who thinks Russia can find the time oj energy to attack Turkey, move into the Middle East, or farther expand in eastern Europe ought to know more about the great problems and troubles Russia has on her hands at home. They then explain, sounding as if they were quoting President Mikhail Kalinin’s speech (TIME, Nov. 19) to Communist Party organizers on how to meet the unrest rising from the relative luxury the Red Army saw in eastern Europe.”

After talking with a “competent western specialist studying Kremlin policies,” TIME’S Berlin Bureau cabled:

“During Stalin’s vacation the Politburo got into a fight. Communist Central Committee Secretary Andrei Zhdanov, Chairman of the Communist Party Control Commission Andrei Andreiev and People’s Commissar of Foreign Trade Anastas Mikoyan urged a moderate Soviet foreign policy. Foreign Commissar Viacheslav Molotov and Commissar of Internal Affairs Lavrenti Beria were for a more aggressive policy. Molotov had acted on this basis at the last London conference. When Stalin returned, he threw his weight on the moderate side and stressed the overwhelming importance for Russia of getting along with the U.S. and Britain at least long enough to attain a substantial rise in Soviet living standards. Consequently Vishinsky went to London with instructions to be more ‘reasonable.’ “

Food & Shelter. Was Russia playing possum by deliberately stressing Soviet weakness? It was conceivable, but far from likely. The war had cost Russian production a decade of progress. She could not make that up if a Big Three split forced her to continue devoting two thirds of her national effort to armaments. Whatever their long-term aims might be, Soviet leaders wanted peace long enough to put more food in Russian bellies, more clothes on Russian backs.

Food was so scarce and drab that a frozen apple rated as a rare delicacy. Millions were still living in dugouts, tents, even the fuselages of grounded airplanes. The huge collective farms were crippled by lack of machinery. The Germans had carried off 190,000 of Russia’s 700,000 tractors and combines. Not until 1950 will tractor production catch up.

Industrial reconstruction is even farther behind. Last week U.S. reporters visited Minsk and saw there a sample of how things were. The new power plant could supply more current than Minsk used before the war. But few Minsk streets are lighted: enough iron for lamp posts, wire for circuits and bulbs for lighting are not to be had. Even public buildings are dark. Though Minsk has power to burn, factories that might consume it cannot get building materials, transport or machines.

Samovars & Doorknobs. One major bottleneck is trained industrial manpower. Russia lost millions of her best workers in the war, and the 5,000,000 or so German prisoners and draftees have the inadequacies of all slave labor. Said one disgruntled Soviet factory director: “When we brought a German who said he was a diesel specialist to a diesel engine that needed repair, he would then say he was a marine diesel specialist. . . . Phooey, they are useless.”

Consumer goods lag behind heavy industry, though stoves, beds, sleighs, stockings, thermometers and bicycles are again being made. Some war plants have been converted. At Tula, a gun foundry was turning out samovars (see cut). Soviet Architect Karo Alabian happily exclaimed: “Our mortar plants are ideally equipped for making doorknobs.”

Trying to whoop up the production drive, Moscow’s Literary Gazette enthused: “Labor is grandeur.” But the Kremlin was well aware that millions of Russians hoped they could put less emphasis on grandeur, more on comfort. Their uneasy neighbors hoped so too.