‘An Ambiguous Area’: Mongolia in Soviet-Japanese relations in the mid-1930s

2019 ◽  
Vol 54 (3) ◽  
pp. 730-758
Author(s):  
BRIAN BRIDGES
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Far East ◽  
Northern China ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
Mutual Assistance ◽  
Intense Competition ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Japanese Military

AbstractThe Mongolian People's Republic (MPR) became the focus of intense competition between the Soviet Union and Japan in the 1930s, when it was more commonly known as Outer Mongolia. The Soviet Union viewed the MPR as an ideological and strategic ally, and was determined to defend that state against the increasingly adventurist actions of the Japanese military based in northern China. Japanese ambitions to solve the so-called ‘Manmo’ (Manchuria-Mongolia) problem led the Soviets to initiate ever-closer links with the MPR, culminating in the 1936 pact of mutual assistance which was intended to constrain Japanese pressure. Using unpublished Japanese materials as well as Russian and Mongolian sources, this article demonstrates how the Soviet leadership increasingly viewed the MPR as strategically crucial to the defence of the Soviet Far East.

scholarly journals The Korean diaspora in the USSR in the 1930s

2021 ◽  
Vol 135 (2) ◽  
pp. 48-62
Author(s):  
N.A. Potapova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Far East ◽  
Korean Population ◽  
Eastern Region ◽  
Korean Diaspora ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Japanese Military ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
Two Stages ◽  
Far Eastern

The article is devoted to the so-called Korean problem in the Soviet Union and ways to find ways to solve it. The Bolsheviks inherited from the Russian Empire the unresolved issue of active settlement of the Far East by Koreans. The migration from Japanese Korea was massive and uncontrolled. Unlike the Chinese, who settled all over the Soviet Union, Koreans settled compactly in the far eastern region. According to the 1937 census, the diaspora in the USSR numbered about 200,000 people. Since the 1920s, the Bolshevik government has attempted to solve the Korean question in the country, including repression of the diaspora. However, the Bolsheviks resorted to drastic and decisive measures in the 1930s. At this time, persecution of the Korean population increased. The main reason for persecution was the desire of the Bolshevik government to rid the country of «unreliable» and «dangerous» elements. The repression of Koreans in the 1930s can be divided into two stages. The first stage covers the period from the beginning of the new decade to the summer of 1937. This period is characterized by sporadic arrests of the Korean population, with the peak of persecution being in 1931- 1932 due to the occupation of Manchuria by Japan and, consequently, a new wave of the Korean population emerged in the Soviet Far East. The Japanese military threat was the main reason for the Bolshevik government to look for foreign spies and agents in the USSR, and the population living in territories occupied by Japan and ending up in the Soviet Union were charged with Japanese espionage. The Koreans therefore became a category of the so-called fifth column. The targeted repressions in the first half of the 1930s were replaced by mass punitive actions in the second half of the 1930s, which reached their peak in 1937-1938. The repression of Koreans in 1937- 1938 comprised conditionally two punitive campaigns. The first campaign was the deportation of far eastern Koreans to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The second was the arrests and convictions of the Korean population during the period of the Great Terror as part of the mass operations of the NKVD (The People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs ), particularly the «Harbin» operation. Before 1937-1938, arrests and convictions of Koreans ranged in the hundreds. Thus, for example, in 1933 213 persons were convicted of espionage, in 1934 - 104, in 1935 - 200. During the period of the Big Terror only under the order No.00593 there were convicted about 5 thousand Koreans.

A Sacred Space Is Never Empty

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victoria Smolkin
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Sacred Space ◽  
Russian Revolution ◽  
Mikhail Gorbachev ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
Sacred Spaces ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Communist Ideology ◽  
History Of ◽  
Soviet Experiment

When the Bolsheviks set out to build a new world in the wake of the Russian Revolution, they expected religion to die off. Soviet power used a variety of tools—from education to propaganda to terror—to turn its vision of a Communist world without religion into reality. Yet even with its monopoly on ideology and power, the Soviet Communist Party never succeeded in overcoming religion and creating an atheist society. This book presents the first history of Soviet atheism from the 1917 revolution to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. The book argues that to understand the Soviet experiment, we must make sense of Soviet atheism. It shows how atheism was reimagined as an alternative cosmology with its own set of positive beliefs, practices, and spiritual commitments. Through its engagements with religion, the Soviet leadership realized that removing religion from the “sacred spaces” of Soviet life was not enough. Then, in the final years of the Soviet experiment, Mikhail Gorbachev—in a stunning and unexpected reversal—abandoned atheism and reintroduced religion into Soviet public life. The book explores the meaning of atheism for religious life, for Communist ideology, and for Soviet politics.

RESTORATION OF THE INFRASTRUCTURE OF YALTA IN 1944

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (72) (4) ◽  
pp. 24-36
Author(s):  
N. D. Borshchik
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Food Industry ◽  
Southern Coast ◽  
Recreational Facilities ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Social ◽  
Health Resorts ◽  
Post War ◽  
Short Time

The article considers little-studied stories in Russian historiography about the post-war state of Yalta — one of the most famous health resorts of the Soviet Union, the «pearl» of the southern coast of Crimea. Based on the analysis of mainly archival sources, the most important measures of the party and Soviet leadership bodies, the heads of garrisons immediately after the withdrawal of the fascist occupation regime were analyzed. It was established that the authorities paid priority attention not only to the destroyed economy and infrastructure, but also to the speedy introduction of all-Union and departmental sanatoriums and recreation houses, other recreational facilities. As a result of their coordinated actions in the region, food industry enterprises, collective farms and cooperative artels, objects of cultural heritage and the social and everyday sphere were put into operation in a short time.

SPATIAL LAYOUT OF THE SOVIET UNION TIMBER PROCESSING COMPLEX: THE IDEA BEHIND THE FIRST FIVE-YEAR PLAN

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 131-154
Author(s):  
Ivan V. ZYKIN
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Far East ◽  
Spatial Layout ◽  
Capital Investments ◽  
Wood Industry ◽  
North West ◽  
The North ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Central Regions

During the years of Soviet power, principal changes took place in the country’s wood industry, including in spatial layout development. Having the large-scale crisis in the industry in the late 1980s — 2000s and the positive changes in its functioning in recent years and the development of an industry strategy, it becomes relevant to analyze the experience of planning the spatial layout of the wood industry during the period of Stalin’s modernization, particularly during the first five-year plan. The aim of the article is to analyze the reason behind spatial layout of the Soviet wood industry during the implementation of the first five-year plan. The study is based on the modernization concept. In our research we conducted mapping of the wood industry by region as well as of planned construction of the industry facilities. It was revealed that the discussion and development of an industrialization project by the Soviet Union party-state and planning agencies in the second half of the 1920s led to increased attention to the wood industry. The sector, which enterprises were concentrated mainly in the north-west, west and central regions of the country, was set the task of increasing the volume of harvesting, export of wood and production to meet the domestic needs and the export needs of wood resources and materials. Due to weak level of development of the wood industry, the scale of these tasks required restructuring of the branch, its inclusion to the centralized economic system, the direction of large capital investments to the development of new forest areas and the construction of enterprises. It was concluded that according to the first five-year plan, the priority principles for the spatial development of the wood industry were the approach of production to forests and seaports, intrasectoral and intersectoral combining. The framework of the industry was meant to strengthen and expand by including forests to the economic turnover and building new enterprises in the European North and the Urals, where the main capital investments were sent, as well as in the Vyatka region, Transcaucasia, Siberia and the Far East.

Introduction: Reflections on Baltic Exceptionalism

1989 ◽  
Vol 17 (02) ◽  
pp. 156-163 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrejs Penikis
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Panel Discussion ◽  
Columbia University ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Key Points ◽  
The Status ◽  
New Thinking ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
Independence Movements

On October 20, 1989 the Harriman Institute's Nationalities and Siberian Studies Program of Columbia University sponsored a panel discussion entitled, “The Baltic Republics Fifty Years After the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.” The panel, consisting of Dr. Allen Lynch, Dr. Stephan Kux, Mr. Jenik Radon and Mr. William Hough, analyzed the current situation in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as well as in the other republics from a variety of perspectives, and debated the motivations and appropriateness of the response of the Western powers to the growing strength of the various independence movements in the Baltic republics. The following edited transcript of those proceedings points up the complex and contentious nature of the status of the Baltic republics in the era of Gorbachev, in both the domestic (Soviet) and international contexts. Nationalist leaders within the Soviet Union debate the appropriate tactics and pace to pursue their goals. The Soviet leadership dabates the extent to which autonomy may be granted to the nationalities. Western leaders consider their options in responding to the changes in the Soviet Union, changes which necessitate an overhaul of policies nearly a half-century old as well as some “new thinking” on their parts. The discussion centered on two issues: (1) What in general has been the response of the West to nationalist movements in the USSR and how appropriate has that response been? (2) Is there any validity to claims of Baltic “exceptionalism”? The following introduction comments briefly on these issues and places them into perspective by drawing on the discussion and exploring several key points.

К вопросу об отношениях между дальневосточными железнодорожниками и Советским руководством с начала 1930-х до 1945 гг

2015 ◽  
Vol 42 (3) ◽  
pp. 274-297
Author(s):  
Elena Nikolaevna Gnatovskaya ◽  
Alexander Alexeevich Kim
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Far East ◽  
Railroad Workers ◽  
Labor Discipline ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
History Of ◽  
New Research ◽  
First Time ◽  
Significant Attention

This work presents new research on the everyday life of railroad workers in the Soviet Far East and their relations with the authorities beginning in the 1930s to 1945. The authors present their findings from a number of archival materials that are examined here for the first time in a scholarly manner. The article examines aspects of labor organization, socialist competition, labor discipline, and workers’ participation in various railway political and ideological campaigns during these years. The authors also give significant attention to the reactions of the workers to the policy of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (cpsu), laborers’ behavior in the workplace, and the history of various mass campaigns.

Natural Hazards Governance in Russia

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Svetlana Badina ◽  
Boris Porfiriev
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Emergency Management ◽  
Natural Disasters ◽  
Natural Hazards ◽  
Russian Federation ◽  
Far East ◽  
Civil Defense ◽  
The Far East ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Russian Federation

A major implication of the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 involved the radical transformation of the national security system. Its fundamentally militaristic paradigm focused on civil defense to prepare and protect communities against the strikes of conventional and nuclear warheads. It called for a more comprehensive and balanced civil protection policy oriented primarily to the communities’ and facilities’ preparedness and response to natural hazards impact and disasters. This change in policy was further catalyzed by the catastrophic results of the major disasters in the late 1980s, such as the Chernobyl nuclear power plant explosion of 1986 and the Armenian earthquake of 1988. As a result, in 1989, a specialized body was organized, the State Emergency Commission at the USSR Council of Ministers. A year later in the Russian Federation (at that time a part of the Soviet Union), an analogous commission was established. In 1991, it was reorganized into the State Committee for Civil Defense, Emergency Management, and Natural Disasters Response at the request of the president of the Russian Federation (EMERCOM). In 1994, this was replaced by the much more powerful Ministry of the Russian Federation for Civil Defense, Emergency Management, and Natural Disasters Response (which kept the abbreviation EMERCOM). In the early 21st century, this ministry is the key government body responsible for (a) development and implementation of the policy for civil defense and the regions’ protection from natural and technological hazards and disasters, and (b) leading and coordinating activities of the federal executive bodies in disaster policy areas within the Russian Federation’s Integrated State System for Emergency Prevention and Response (EPARIS). In addition, as well as in the former Soviet Union, the scientific and research organizations’ efforts to collect relevant data, monitor events, and conduct field and in-house studies to reduce the risk of disasters is crucially important. The nature of EPARIS is mainly a function of the geographic characteristics of the Russian Federation. These include the world’s largest national territory, which is vastly extended both longitudinally and latitudinally, a relatively populous Arctic region, large mountain systems, and other characteristics that create high diversity in the natural environment and combinations of natural hazards. Meanwhile, along with the natural conditions of significant size and a multiethnic composition of the population, distinctive features of a historical development path and institutional factors also contribute to diversity of settlement patterns, a high degree of economic development, and a level and quality of human life both within and between the regions of Russia. For instance, even within one of the region’s urbanized areas with a high-quality urban environment and developed socioeconomic institutions, neighboring communities exist with a traditional lifestyle and economic relations, primitive technological tools, and so on (e.g., indigenous small ethnic groups of the Russian North, Siberia, and the Far East). The massive spatial disparity of Russia creates different conditions for exposure and vulnerability of the regions to natural hazards’ impacts on communities and facilities, which has to be considered while preparing, responding to, and recovering from disasters. For this reason, EMERCOM’s organizational structure includes a central (federal) headquarters as well as Central, Northwestern, Siberian, Southern, and Moscow regional territorial branches and control centers for emergency management in all of the 85 administrative entities (subjects) of the Russian Federation. Specific features of both the EMERCOM territorial units and ministries and EPARIS as a whole coping with disasters are considered using the 2013 catastrophic flood in the Amur River basin in the Far East of Russia as a case study.

The State of the Soviet Union

Worldview ◽  
1985 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-6
Author(s):  
William D. Jackson
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Average Rate ◽  
Annual Growth ◽  
Industrial Plant ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Food Shortages ◽  
Per Capita ◽  
Time Of Troubles ◽  
Per Capita Consumption

The 1980s have become and are likely to remain a new “time of troubles” for the Soviet Union. Principal among these troubles is a faltering economy. The average rate of annual growth for the Eleventh Five-Year Plan (1981-86) is likely to be just over 2 per cent, half the rate achieved a decade ago; and die productivity of both labor and capital in industry during the first three years of the present Plan actually declined. Although investment in machinery production has increased by more than 20 per cent—a key element of a strategy designed to accelerate the modernization of an aged industrial plant—the growth in production of new machinery remains at a postwar low. Increased investment in agriculture has also produced disappointing results, and food shortages in cities are likely to recur in '85. The Soviet leadership must be equally troubled by the fact that, despite rising consumer expectations, growth in per capita consumption during the first three years of the present Plan has averaged a mere 1 per cent—a sharp contrast to the 4-5 per cent realized during the 1970s.

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