22.2. Socio-economic and political reasons that complicated the country's access to new frontiers

In 1964, as a result of the removal of N.S. Khrushchev came to power by the conservative wing of the party elite, headed by L.I. Brezhnev (1906-1982), which has embarked on the curtailment of reforms in the economy and in public life.

Since the mid 70s. symptoms of crisis phenomena in the economy began to appear: a slowdown in the development of scientific and technological progress; equipment obsolescence in leading industries; lag infrastructural industries from the main production; there has been a resource crisis, manifested in the transfer of extraction of natural resources to remote areas, in the appreciation of the extracted raw materials for industry, in the shortage of material resources.

All this had a negative impact on the main economic indicators of the national economy. With each five-year plan, their average annual growth rates decreased:

The average annual growth rate of the main indicators of the economy of the USSR (%)

The ratio of the increase in national income and the increase in fixed assets (and this is an important indicator of the economic efficiency of the national economy) has deteriorated. From 1960 to 1985 fixed assets increased sevenfold, and national income generated only four times. This indicated that the country's economy developed mainly through extensive means, that is, the volume of additional products and the increase in national income were achieved due to the priority involvement in the production of natural and labor resources, and the growth of fixed assets. The reason for this was the ambitious foreign policy of the country's leading circles, which required a superpowerful military potential created by the military-industrial complex (MIC). Huge material and financial resources were needed for the development and maintenance of the military-industrial complex. These resources could be obtained only at the expense of other branches of the national economy and low wages of the working people.

All this, in turn, was provided by a rigid administrative planning and distribution system for managing the country and its economy, and strictly limiting material and financial resources. In order to ensure the rapid acquisition of these resources, preference was given to extensive management methods, which hindered the development of scientific and technological progress.

Formation of unrealistic national economic plans and production plans of enterprises is also connected with the desire to receive in a short time the maximum volume of the gross social product and the national income generated. This led to their non-fulfillment, to permanent shortages of material resources, to abrasions in the work of enterprises, to the low quality of their products.

The cause of negative phenomena in the economy was also voluntarism and in many cases the low professionalism of the top and middle managers of the so-called nomenclature of party and Soviet bodies. The personnel policy pursued by the country's leadership was aimed at the inviolability of the party system of training and promotion of leading cadres. Experts and leaders could self-realize only as members of the Communist Party and working in party organizations and party, Soviet, Komsomol and trade union bodies.

Democratic centralism, the indisputability of authorities of party and other leaders of any level, their intolerance of criticism led to the fact that the party-Soviet and any other nomenklatura often included people who were obedient, but did not possess either intelligence, initiative, or other qualities necessary for executives. Thus, with each generation, the intellectual and professional potential of the leaders of the party and Soviet bodies, enterprises and organizations in the country decreased.

The low level of wages did not contribute to saving labor resources and using the achievements of scientific and technological progress. Extensive methods of economic development, the unreasonable construction of new enterprises led to a gap between the growth in the number of jobs and the increase in labor resources. If in the prewar and first postwar five-year periods, the growth of labor resources in the cities was ensured by rural residents and women, then by the 80s. these sources are almost exhausted.

So, in 1976-1980. increase in labor resources amounted to 11.0 million, in 1981-1985. - 3.3 million, in 1986-1990. - 2.5 million people. The socio-economic consequences of such development were expressed in a reduction in labor and technological discipline, economic responsibility of workers for the results of labor, losses and losses, in a decrease in the growth rates of labor productivity, industrial and agricultural production, and national income.

The economic and then political crisis that erupted in the country in the late 80s - early 90s. and led to the collapse of the USSR into a number of independent states, was due to many years of inefficient economic policies pursued by the country's leadership, its ambition in international relations. This led to the economic depletion of the state, to the discrediting of the socialist mode of production and the entire world socialist system.

One of the main reasons for the difficult economic situation in which the country found itself was the hypertrophied development of the military-industrial complex — the militarization of the economy.

For many decades, the vast majority of the state’s material and labor resources went to the military-industrial complex. The final products of defense enterprises provided the military potential of the country, but the economic return from the material, financial and labor resources used in the military-industrial complex to solve the country's economic and social problems was insignificant, on the contrary, huge budget allocations were required for the activities of these enterprises, and their products were mainly stockpiled. Even the new technologies that were developed in the military-industrial complex, because of their secrecy, did not flow into other sectors of the national economy and therefore did not have the necessary influence on the development of scientific and technological progress in the country.

The military potential of the USSR, created at the cost of tremendous efforts and due to the constant underfinancing of other sectors of the economy, ensured the defense power of the state. But this same potential encouraged an ambitious foreign policy of the country's leadership, as a result of which there were constant international tensions and an arms race.

So it was in 1950 in North Korea, when hostilities began between North Korea and the United States; in 1962, in Cuba, when, after the deployment of Soviet missiles there, the US government presented an ultimatum to the USSR to eliminate them on the island. The world was on the verge of a new world war and even thermonuclear. Missile launchers in Cuba were dismantled.

In 1968 there was a military conflict between the USSR and the PRC because of the Domansky island on the Amur. In fact, it was the first in the history of the military clash of two states from the socialist camp.

The military presence of the USSR, Soviet weapons were in Korea, Vietnam, Angola, Egypt, Syria, Iraq and other countries.

These were short-term international conflicts, and not the direct participation of the USSR in wars with other states. But in 1978, the Soviet Union was involved in a protracted war in Afghanistan. This war had serious consequences for the country, expressed in undermining the international authority of the USSR, further economic exhaustion, and a negative psychological climate inside the country.

The excessive development of the military industrial complex and the lagging behind of civilian branches of the national economy led to their technical backwardness and lack of competitiveness on the world market. Within the country, this led to a famine, a constant shortage of products necessary to meet the daily needs of the population. These products were distributed to enterprises and institutions by the so-called exit trade. The lack of consumer goods in free sale led to corruption in circulation, higher prices.

Unsatisfied demand for goods gave impetus to the creation of underground enterprises and the development of the shadow economy, corruption of officials, social stratification of the population, changes in the social structure of society, and an increase in citizens' discontent.

The agribusiness complex of the country did not function effectively enough. In agricultural production, extensive methods prevailed. The emphasis was on expanding the use of land resources. Despite the increase in livestock numbers, organic fertilizers were used poorly, but chemical fertilizers were not enough, and their quality was low. As a result, the yield of main crops was noticeably lower than in other European countries.

One of the vulnerable sides of the agro-industrial complex was the weak development of the infrastructure and capacities for processing agricultural products. There was not enough storage for the harvested crop, good roads in the countryside, repair services and spare parts for agricultural machinery. All this led to the fact that the planted areas were not always cleaned in time, the harvested crops were poorly stored.

As a result, food crises came on permanently in the country, which forced them to buy from 20 to 40 million tons of grain crops annually, while the food and light industries did not have enough raw materials.

Scientists, economists, sociologists, and ecologists have drawn the attention of the country's leadership to the danger and consequences of the hypertrophied development of the military-industrial complex and the backwardness of civilian industries and agriculture. But their opinion was not taken into account. By the mid-80s. This has begun to be understood in central government. The reason for this was the deterioration of the financial state of the state. The situation in the sphere of material production directly and most rapidly affects the finances, money circulation and the budget of the country.

Finance, money circulation and the budget are a mirror of the state, a barometer of its economic condition and political position. And no matter how argued the apologists of the primacy of the spirituality and morality of society over the economy, the five thousand-year history of all states testifies to the opposite. With the collapse of the economy, the collapse of finances in the state, spirituality, morality and culture are falling. And our country was no exception.

In the first post-war decade, Soviet finances reflected the progressive development of the country's economy. Changes in the structure of the gross social product had a favorable effect on finances. The share of industry in the production of gross social product and national income increased, which contributed to the growth of profits, revenues to the budget, deductions from profits and turnover tax. The monetary reform successfully carried out in 1947 strengthened the circulation and finances of the country.

The centralization of the overwhelming part of financial resources in the state budget (it is enough to note that the state budget in the national income used exceeded 70%) made it possible to concentrate funds on the most important areas of the country's economic and social development and thereby solve state problems more quickly and efficiently. From 1938 to 1960 The country's financial department was headed by a well-known economist and professional financier, who did a lot to strengthen the country's finances A. G. Zverev (1900-1969).

By the end of the 50s N.S. Khrushchev, having defeated all his rivals and oppositionists, having finally established himself as a party leader and head of state, increasingly began to lead the state by a method that was later called voluntarism.

In the USSR, the voluntarist approach was used before N.S. Khrushchev and not only in foreign and domestic policy, in the economy, but also in finance. The executor of the voluntarist course N.S. Khrushchev in finance became appointed in 1960 by the Minister of Finance V.F. Garbuzov is a man, like N.S. Khrushchev, not professionally trained, ambitious and rude.

For the centuries-old history of Russia, the management of state finances by an incompetent person was not a rare occurrence. A parallel can be drawn between V.F. Garbuzov and I.A. Vyshnegradsky (1831 / 32-1895), who was the Minister of Finance of Russia in 1888-1892, and before that in scientific circles, he was known as a scientist in the field of the theory of designing machines, applied mechanics, and thermodynamics. Both were ministers before they became involved in finance. Both pursued a policy of forming budget revenues mainly through the sale of alcoholic beverages and the export of natural resources from the country. Only in the time of I.A. Vyshnegradsky exported grain from Russia even when there was a famine in the country during bad years (the phrase of that period was known: “not enough to eat, but we will take out”), and during the time of V.F. Garbuzov exported oil, although the collective and state farms did not have enough fuel for agricultural equipment during harvesting (this was one of the reasons that the losses of farmed agricultural products were about 50%).

It was with the arrival in the Ministry of Finance of the USSR V.F. Garbuzov, who, unlike A.G. Zvereva could not and apparently did not want to substantiate his position and prevent the adoption of decisions weakening the budget, destabilization of state finances begins, despite the fact that the country and the staff of the Ministry of Finance had qualified financial personnel.

The monetary reform (denomination), carried out in 1961, not only did not strengthen finances, but also led to the beginning of a rise in prices. The main source of budget revenues - the turnover tax, the share of which in budget revenues reached 60%, was often levied on enterprises before the products subject to this tax were sold to the final consumer. As a result, the financial condition of enterprises weakened, as they often paid this tax at the expense of their working capital.

In the 60-70-ies. One of the major sources of state financial resources was income from foreign economic activity. These were mainly revenues from the sale of raw materials, mainly oil. During this period, the country received more than 150 billion dollars. These funds were spent on the purchase of equipment for enterprises, on the construction of civilian and military facilities, on the purchase of food and consumer goods.

These funds made it possible to subsidize the products of many enterprises and, thus, in fact, the population that bought food, medicines, children's goods, used the services of housing and urban passenger transport at prices lower than their prime cost. The proceeds from the sale of natural resources were a significant source of the formation of public consumption funds, which made it possible to provide free education, culture, and health care.

However, by the beginning of the 1980s, difficulties began to arise in obtaining such funds. The basis of this was a number of reasons. It has become more difficult to maintain the previous level of oil production. The old oil fields were drying up. Geological conditions of mining have deteriorated. Light oil decreased significantly. For the extraction of heavy oil, special equipment was needed, but the machine-building industry was not prepared for its production.

Changed and the conjuncture of the international oil market. Increasingly, energy-saving technologies were introduced in the economy. This entailed a reduction in energy demand. In the oil market increased competition of oil-producing countries. Oil prices were declining.

In addition, the content of the military-industrial complex, maintaining the previous level of development of the social sphere demanded increasing budget allocations. Their source was foreign loans and the country's gold reserves, which fell from 2,050 tons in 1953 to 340 tons in 1996.

It should be noted that the external debt of the USSR was equal to about 80 billion dollars. Approximately the same amount in our country should have been other states. However, if our debt was mainly to firms and banks for industrial and agricultural products acquired, the USSR provided loans to other countries for the sale of its military-industrial complex products to the socialist camp (Vietnam, Cuba, etc.), but mainly to the Third World (Iraq, Syria Egypt, Angola, Afghanistan, etc.), whose monetary solvency was extremely low.

Thus, if the state budget expenditures on the repayment of external debt grew, the revenues from external sources decreased.

All this led to a deterioration in public finances, an increase in the budget deficit, which was increasingly covered by money emission and an increase in the country's domestic debt. Against this background, the need to increase budget allocations for subsidizing branches of the national economy grew. Дотации убыточным предприятиям, главным образом ВПК и сельскохозяйственным, достигающие одной пятой части всех бюджетных расходов и ставшие главной причиной бюджетного дефицита, практически поощряли их иждивенчество и бесхозяйственность. Потери и непроизводительные расходы в народном хозяйстве ежегодно увеличивались. Так, с 1981 по 1988 гг. они выросли с 12,5 млрд. руб. до 29,0 млрд руб., в том числе сверхплановые потери от брака в промышленности и строительстве выросли с 364 до 1076 млн. руб., потери от списания затрат по неосуществленному и окончательно прекращенному капитальному строительству – с 2831 до 4631 млн. руб., потери от падежа скота – с 1696 до 1912 млн. руб. Для сравнения укажем, что в 1988 г. объем доходов государственного бюджета составлял 379 млрд. руб., т.е. в этом году потери в народном хозяйстве составляли более 7% к бюджетным доходам.

Эти и другие подобные причины негативно влияли на состояние государственных финансов, приближали финансовый кризис, разразившийся в начале 90-х гг, который не смогли предотвратить постоянно меняющиеся министры финансов (с 1985 по начало 1997 гг. этот пост занимали десять человек, а некоторые из них всего по несколько месяцев). Министерская чехарда, уход из финансовых органов в коммерческие структуры большого количества профессиональных работников, разделение министерства финансов на ряд самостоятельных ведомств, отсутствие между ними должной координации еще более ослабили систему управления государственными финансами и финансовое состояние государства.

Все эти факторы заставляли руководство страны искать пути выхода из создавшегося положения. Была осознана необходимость структурной перестройки промышленности, изменения экономических отношений в народном хозяйстве. Это выразилось в попытках расширения хозрасчета, установления прямых экономических связей между предприятиями, введения арендных отношений и др.

Структурная перестройка промышленности должна была проводиться на основе конверсии предприятий ВПК. Однако из-за отсутствия в бюджете необходимых средств на капитальные вложения и противодействия директоров оборонных предприятий, не желавших производить гражданскую продукцию, товары массового спроса, конверсия проводилась в ограниченных размерах.

Негибкость и во многих случаях некомпетентность руководителей высшего и среднего звеньев управления привели к отставанию предприятий, не входящих в ВПК, их несостоятельности в обеспечении внутреннего рынка и неконкурентоспособности сначала на внешнем, а затем и внутреннем рынках, Как результат этого – потеря в 80-х гг. рынков в странах СЭВ, а затем в 90-х гг. – рынков СНГ и, наконец, по многим позициям был потерян рынок сбыта и в самой России.

The countries that are members of NATO have contributed to the creation of economic difficulties for the Soviet Union. The longstanding confrontation between the two military-political blocs showed that success in the Cold War could only be achieved on the economic battlefield. To achieve this success, analysts of Western countries identified weaknesses in the economy of the USSR, and the governments of the NATO countries took measures aimed at weakening the Soviet economy. To this end, large-scale campaigns were organized to reduce the price of oil on the world market and restrict the export of Soviet natural gas, which led to a decrease in foreign currency convertible into the Soviet Union. The introduction by the United States of America of a ban on the acquisition by the Soviet Union of new industrial products and new technologies, the growth of military weapons of NATO countries,the increase in their technological level and cost exacerbated the resource and technological crisis of the USSR, necessitating an increase in their own military scientific research. All this led to its further economic exhaustion. At the same time, Western countries created conditions that impede the receipt of foreign loans by the Soviet Union.

In parallel with the economic crisis, ideological and then political crises ripened in the country.

Occurred in the 60s. The dissident movement, almost suppressed by repression in the 70s and 80s, began to develop rapidly again. At the center of this movement was the struggle for civil rights, for the de-ideologization of culture, for the democratization of society and the abolition of the monopoly of the CPSU in public life.

Simultaneously with this movement, and sometimes within its framework, nationalist movements developed in the republics of the USSR.

В ходе борьбы с коммунистической идеологией особым нападкам подвергались такие понятия, как интернационализм, классовая борьба, пролетарская солидарность, дружба народов. При этом националисты во всех республиках СССР на основе исторических построений и искаженных экономических расчетов стремились доказать, что одни нации живут за счет труда других. In the conditions of such a multinational state as the USSR, this propaganda was destructive in nature, contributed to the formation in society of the consciousness of the necessity and inevitability of the collapse of the state. The main role in this propaganda was played by the nationalist-minded intelligentsia, which in essence was the ideologue and mouthpiece of the nationalist party elite and representatives of the criminal-shadow economy. All of them sought to power, to achieve their narrow group interests and were against strong central government, which prevented them from achieving their goals. Поэтому они разжигали межнациональные конфликты, которые в конце 80-х – начале 90-х гг. прокатились по стране (в Азербайджане, Армении, Узбекистане, Киргизии, Грузии, Молдавии и других республиках). Именно они способствовали развалу государства, и из партийных функционеров и представителей националистической интеллигенции вышли лидеры, ставшие впоследствии главами новых государств, созданных на развалинах СССР.

Все они игнорировали тот факт, что в условиях многовекового сосуществования в рамках единого государства народов, населявших СССР, было создано единое экономическое пространство, произошло смешение этих народов (например, в 1988 г. удельный вес межнациональных браков в общей численности всех браков основных национальностей СССР колебался от 7 до 38%), смена мест проживания десятков миллионов людей (вне России в 1989 г. проживало более 25 млн. русских, а в России – около 8 млн. человек из других республик СССР).

The consequence of such propaganda was not only the collapse of the largest in the XX century. states in the world, but also significant economic losses in each of the former republics of the USSR, the displacement of a huge number of people from the republic to the republic (in the period 1992-1995 only 3.8 million people officially moved to Russia, and 1 , 8 million people).