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The Formation of the Virgin Lands Policy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Richard M. Mills
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Extract

Shrouded behind a veil of semisecrecy, the making of policy decisions in the Soviet Union has been a fertile source of endless speculation and research. From time to time, happily, it becomes possible to penetrate rather deeply into the arcana of the process and turn up some illuminating materials. The decision to cultivate the virgin lands is a good case in point, and now the older Western analyses of the politics surrounding that event can be expanded substantially on the basis of information published in recent years.

Type
Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 29 , Issue 1 , March 1970 , pp. 58 - 69
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1970

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References

1. For those analyses see Robert, Conquest, Pozver and Policy in the USSR (New York, 1961), pp. 234–43 Google Scholar; Roger, Pethybridge, A Key to Soviet Politics : The Crisis of the Anti-Party Group (New York, 1962), pp. 50–52 Google Scholar; Ploss, Sidney I., Conflict and Decision-Making in Soviet Russia (Princeton, 1965), p. 82–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2. Nikita, Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunizma v SSSR i razvitie sel'skogo khosiaistva, 8 vols. (Moscow, 1962-64), 2 : 252–53.Google Scholar Khrushchev's statement was made in a speech delivered in Kazakhstan in 1956, but this passage was deleted in the version published at the time. Cf. Kazakhstanskaia pravda, July 31, 1956.

3. Pravda, Nov. 17, 1960, Shevchenko's article. The question of where Khrushchev got the idea to plow the virgin lands therefore seemingly remains unanswered. But more on this matter later.

4. Kazakhstanskaia pravda, Jan. 20, 1963, N. Dyshlovoi. See Baranov, M. and Skorobogatov, V., eds., Gody velikikh svershenii (Alma-Ata, 1960), pp. 209–11, Google Scholar for a detailed account of the meeting at which representatives of the USSR Ministry of Agriculture were also present.

5. Baishev, S. et al., eds., Ocherki istorii Kommunisticheskoi partii Kazakhstan (Alma-Ata, 1963), pp. 497–98.Google Scholar The authors of this book, the official history of the Kazakh party, took some pains to cite party archives in making the point that instructions were given. It did, after all, contradict Khrushchev's version.

6. Poliakov, V. I., Serdechnye vstrechi (Moscow, 1959), p. 5.Google Scholar

7. Savosko, V. K., ed., Narodnoe dvishenie sa osvoenie tselinnykh zemel’ v Kazakhstane (Moscow, 1959), p. 33.Google Scholar

8. Pravda, Oct. 10, 1953.

9. Savosko, Narodnoe dvishenie, p. 53.

10. Baranov and Skorobogatov, Gody velikikh svershenii, p. 211.

11. It must be stressed again that the USSR Ministry of Agriculture, and not only the party apparatus, had been involved in discussions of the project immediately following the September plenum (see note 4). In December a special governmental commission was formed to deal with the virgin lands when the huge size of the endeavor began to be apparent. See Istoriia SSSR, 1965, no. 5, p. 142.

12. See ibid., and also Pravda's report (Feb. 22, 1954) dealing with the Kazakh party congress.

13. See Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunisma, 1 : 85-100, for the complete text. Appended to the memorandum, but not published with it, were various supporting documents, including newspaper articles on the subject.

14. Khrushchev cited that figure in the memorandum when making his main point. See ibid., 1 : 89. Even that rrore limited program was apparently lagging. See Direktivy KPSS i Sovetskogo pravitel'sr'a po khoziaistvennym voprosam, 1917-^1957 gg. : Sbornik dokumentov, 4 vols. (Moscow, 19J7-58), 4 : 167. In many respects, Khrushchev's proposals in the memorandum bore a remarkable resemblance to two previous virgin lands programs undertaken in 1940 and 1946. See Resheniia partii i pravitel'stva po khoziaistvennym voprosam (Moscow, 1967-68), 2 : 749-52; see also Direktivy, 3 : 135-45.

15. Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunizma, 1 : 96.

16. Voprosy istorii, 1962, no. 8, p. 6. See also Pravda, Jan. 25, 1954. The use of the word “extensive” at this stage had a significance that will be commented upon later.

17. Pravda, Jan. 29, 1954.

18. Ibid., Jan. 30, 1954.

19. Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunisma, 1 : 101-33.

20. See Istoriia SSSR, 1965, no. 5, p. 142; Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunizma, 1 : 275-76; Pravda, Feb. 12, 1954.

21. On Molotov, see Plenum Tsentral'nogo Komiteta Kommunisticheskoi partii Sovetskogo Soinza, 15-19 dekabria 1958 g. : Stenograficheskii otchet (Moscow, 1959), pp. 15-16, for Khrushchev on this point; D. Poliansky provides confirmation in XXII S“ezd Kommunisticheskoi partii Sovetskogo Soiuza, 17-31 oktiabria 1961 g. : Stenograficheskii otchet, 3 vols. (Moscow, 1962), 2 : 42. On Kaganovich, see Plenum, p. 408, for Iurkin's statement and pp. 421-22 for Matskevich's substantiation. On Saburov, see Plenum, p. 408. Iurkin here refers to objections raised by the State Planning Commission, then headed by Saburov, that the material resources needed to carry out the program were lacking.

22. The only mention of Malenkov's having entered a specific objection at this time came in Bulganin's impassioned speech to the Central Committee in 1958. See Plenum, p. 340. One hesitates to take this statement at face value, partly because Bulganin is the only one to have made the accusation and partly because he refers here not only to the virgin lands policy but also to the proposal made by Khrushchev almost simultaneously to change the method of planning in agriculture. It is therefore not clear just which policy (if not both) Malenkov was allegedly objecting to.

23. See XXII S“esd, 1 : 105-6.

24. Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunisma, 1 : 139.

25. Iurkin in Plenum, p. 408. Iurkin here couples his enumeration of the objections with the insinuation that they were actually groundless and were raised merely for base reasons. While ill will may have played a part, the future would show that the objections had some basis in fact.

26. On Molotov, see Conquest, Power and Policy, pp. 234-43, where copious quotations assist in establishing the specific objections entered by the various opponents.

27. These articles were doubtless among those appended to Khrushchev's memorandum (see note 13).

28. The last three conferences were formally convoked by the joint decision of the Central Committee and the Council of Ministers, a fact of some importance inasmuch as, according to Khrushchev, the same two bodies also decided to convoke the plenum of February-March. See Khrushchev, Stroitel'stvo kommunisma, 1 : 133. To put the matter quite accurately, the meetings were convoked jointly by the Presidium, the Secretariat, and the Council of Ministers. The surprising element, nevertheless, was that the Council of Ministers had been involved in calling a plenum. As for the last three agricultural conferences, the Presidium attended at least the opening session of each, and it seems safe to assume that the Presidium or some of its members held private meetings with delegates at which the virgin lands were discussed.