| First six months of 1918 | 762,895,100 | rubles |
| Second six months of 1918 | 5,141,073,179 | “ |
| First six months of 1919 | 15,439,115,828 | “ |
The report calls attention to the fact that whereas it had been estimated that there would be paid into the treasury during the first six months of 1919 for goods issued for consumption 1,503,516,945 rubles, the sum actually received was 54,564,677 rubles—that is, only 3.5 per cent.
Some idea of the conditions prevailing can be gathered from the desperate attempts to produce substitutes for much-needed articles. The ersatz experiments and achievements of the Germans during the war may have had something to do with this. At all events, we find attempts made in the cotton-factories to use “cottonized” flax as a substitute for cotton (207). These attempts did not afford any satisfactory or encouraging results. In consequence of the almost complete stoppage of the sugar industry we find the Soviet authorities resorting to attempts to produce sugar from sawdust (207). Even more pathetic is the manner in which attempts were made to supply salt. This necessary commodity had, for all practical purposes, completely disappeared from the market, though on October 3d, in Petrograd, it was quoted at 140 to 150 rubles per pound (221). As a result of this condition, in several districts old herring-barrels, saturated with salt, were cut up into small pieces and used in cooking instead of salt (205). A considerable market for these pieces of salted wood was found.
We may profitably close this summary of the economic situation in Soviet Russia in October and November, 1919, by quoting from the report of the Chief Administration of Engineering Works:
If we had reason to fear last year for the working of our transport, the complaints of its inefficiency being well grounded, matters have become considerably worse during the period under report. Water transport is by no means in a better position, whilst of haulage transport there is no need to speak.... The consuming needs of the workmen have not been even remotely satisfied, either in the last year or in the current year, by the Commissariat of Food Supply, the main source of food-supply of the workmen being speculation and free market. But even the latter source of food-supply of the workmen in manufacturing districts is becoming more and more inaccessible. Besides the fact that prices have soared up to a much greater extent than the controlled rates of wages, we see the almost complete disappearance of food articles from working-center markets. Of recent times, even pilgrimage to villages is of no avail. The villages will not part with food for money even at high prices. What they demand is articles of which the workers are no less in need. Hence the workers’ escape from the factories (220).
Unfortunately, a good many of the concerns enumerated [in the Tula District] do not work or work only with half the output, in spite of the fact that 20 of the shafts working yield considerable quantities of coal, 10 mines supply much raw material (15 milliard poods of minerals are estimated to be lying in this district), whilst there is also a large number of broken lathes and machinery which can, however, be repaired. Bread for the workers could also be found, if all efforts were strained (the district used to export corn in peace-time). All these possibilities are not carried into life, as there are no people who could by their intense will and sincere desire restore the iron discipline of labor. Our institutions are filled with “Sovburs” and “Speks,” who only think of their own welfare and not of the welfare of the state and of making use of the revolutionary possibilities of the “toilers in revolt.”
In the light of this terrible evidence we can readily believe what Zinoviev wrote in an article contributed to the Severnaya Communa in January of this year. In that article he said: “King Famine seems to be putting out his tongue at the proletariat of Petrograd and their families.... Of late I have been receiving, one after another, starving delegations from working men and women. They do not protest, nor do they make any demands; they merely point out, with silent reproach, the present intolerable state of affairs.”
We are not dependent upon general statements such as Zinoviev’s for our information concerning the state of affairs in Soviet Russia in January, 1920. We have an abundance of precise and authoritative data. In the first place, Gregor Alexinsky has published, in admirable translation, the text of the most important parts of the reports made to the Joint Congress of the Councils of National Economy, Trades-Unions and the Central Soviet Power. This congress opened in Moscow on January 25, 1920, and lasted for several days. Important reports were made to it by A. Rykov, president of the Supreme Council of National Economy; M. Tomsky, chairman of the Central Council of Trades-Unions; Kamenev, president of the Moscow Soviet; Lenin, Trotsky, and others. Alexinsky was fortunate enough to secure copies of the stenographic reports of the speeches made at this joint congress. In addition to this material the present writer has had placed at his disposal several issues of Izvestia containing elaborate reports of the congress. At the outset Rykov dealt with the effects of the World War and the Civil War upon the economic situation:
During the past few years of Imperialistic (World) and Civil Wars the exhaustion of the countries of Europe, and in particular of Russia, has reached unheard-of proportions. This exhaustion has affected the whole territory of the Imperialistic war, but the Civil war has been, as regards dissipation of the national wealth and waste of material and human resources, much more detrimental than the Imperialistic war, for it spread across the greater part of the territory of Soviet Russia, involving not only the clashing of armies, but also devastation, fires, and destruction of objects of greatest value and of structures.
The Civil War, having caused an unparalleled waste of the human and material resources of the Republic, has engendered an economic and productive crisis. In its main features this crisis is one of transportation, fuel, and human labor power.