Truly these are interesting admissions—here is “a very Daniel come to judgment.” The civil war, we are told, has been “much more detrimental than the Imperialistic war,” it has “caused an unparalleled waste of the human and material resources of the republic.” Is it not pertinent to remind ourselves that for bringing on the civil war the Bolsheviki were solely responsible? There was no civil war in Russia until they began it. The whole of the democratic forces of Russia were unitedly working for the reconstruction of the nation upon a sound basis of free democracy. They began the civil war in the face of the most solemn warnings and despite the fact that every thoughtful person could foresee its inevitable disastrous results. By Rykov’s confession the Bolsheviki are condemned for having brought upon Russia evils greater than those which the World War brought in its train. Of the transportation problem Rykov has this to say:
Before the war, the percentage of disabled locomotives, even in the worst of times, never rose above 15 per cent. At the present time, however, we have 59.5 per cent. of disabled locomotives—i.e., out of every 100 locomotives in Soviet Russia 60 are disabled, and only 40 capable of working. The repair of disabled locomotives also keeps on declining with extraordinary rapidity; before the war we used to repair up to 8 per cent.; this percentage, after the October revolution, sometimes dropped to 1 per cent.; now we have gone up, but only 1 per cent., and we are now repairing 2 per cent. of our locomotives. Under present conditions of railway transportation the repairs do not keep abreast of the deterioration of our locomotives, and every month we have, in absolute figures, 200 locomotives less than the preceding month. It is indispensable that we raise the repair of locomotives from 2 per cent. up to 10 per cent., in order to stop the decline and further disintegration of railway transportation, in order to maintain it at least on the level on which it stands at the present time. As for the broad masses of the population, the workers and peasants of Soviet Russia, these figures simply mean that there is no possibility of utilizing any one of those grain-producing regions, nor those which have raw material and fuel, that have been added to Soviet Russia as a result of the victory of the Red Army.
According to Trotsky, Rykov’s figures, depressing enough in all conscience, did not disclose the full gravity of the situation. The real number of disabled locomotives was greater than the figures given, he said, for the reason that “we frequently call ‘sound’ half-disabled locomotives which threaten to drop out completely on the morrow.” Rykov’s statements do more than merely confirm those previously quoted from the Economicheskaya Zhizn: they show that from October to January there had been a steady increase of deterioration; that conditions had gone from bad to worse. The report proceeds to illustrate the seriousness of the situation by concrete examples of the actual conditions confronting the government:
We have a metallurgical region in the Ural mountains; but we have had at our disposal until now but one single special train a month to carry metals from the Urals to central Russia. In order to transport 10 million poods[58] of metal by one single train per month several decades would be required, should we be able to utilize those scanty supplies of metal which are ready in the Urals.
[58] One pood equals thirty-six pounds.
In order to deliver cotton from Turkestan to the textile factories in Moscow, we have to carry more than one-half million poods per month—up to 600,000 poods. But at this time we have only about two trains a month; that is, scores of years will be required for transporting under present conditions from Turkestan those 8 million poods of cotton which we could convert, but are unable to deliver to the factories.
The disorganized and demoralized state of the transportation system was only partly responsible for the shortage of raw materials, however. It was only one of several causes: “On account of the disorganized state of transportation we are unable to obtain cotton now, as the railroads are unable to carry it here. But even as regards those raw materials which are produced in the central parts of Soviet Russia, such as flax, wool, hemp, hides, even in these raw stuffs Soviet Russia is experiencing a severe crisis.” Attention is called to the enormous decline in the production of flax, the acreage devoted to this crop being only 30 per cent. of that formerly devoted to it and the yield very much poorer. Rykov offers as an explanation of this condition the fact that, as the Soviet Government had not been able to deliver to the peasants in the flax-producing districts “any considerable quantity of foodstuffs,” the peasants grew foodstuffs instead of flax. He adds, “Another reason why the peasants began to cultivate grains instead of flax was that the speculative prices of bread are higher than the fixed prices of flax at which the state is purchasing it.” He pours the cold water of realism upon the silly talk of huge exports of flax from Russia as soon as trade with foreign nations is opened up, and says, “But we shall not be able to export large quantities of flax abroad, and the catastrophic decline in flax production as compared with 1919 raises the question whether the flax industry shall not experience in 1920 a flax shortage similar to the one experienced by the textile industry in cotton.”
Rykov calls attention to the decline in the production of hides for leather and of wool. During the first six months of 1919 the hides collected amounted to about one million pieces, but the total for the whole of 1920 was not expected to exceed 650,000 pieces. “The number of hides delivered to the government decreases with every succeeding month.” There was also to be observed “a decline in the quantity of live stock, especially those kinds which furnish wool for our woolen mills.” But perhaps the most impressive part of his report is that dealing with the fuel shortage. Though adjacent to large coal-fields, as well as to vast forests, Moscow in the winter of 1919-20 lacked fuel “even for heating the infirmaries and hospitals.” For the winter of 1919-20 the Council of People’s Commissaries had fixed the necessary quantity of wood for fuel to be produced at 12,000,000 to 14,000,000 cubic sagenes (one cubic sagene being equal to two cubic meters). But the Administrations which were charged with the work forwarded to the railroads and to the rivers less than 2,500,000 sagenes. It must be added that of these same 2,500,000 sagenes the Soviet Administrations were not able to transport to the cities and industrial centers more than a very small quantity, and “even the minimum program of supply of fuel for the factories of Moscow could not be carried out because of the lack of means of transport.”
Bad as this is, the coal-supply is in a worse condition yet. “Things are going badly for the production of coal and petroleum” we are told. Upon their reoccupation of the Donetz Basin the Bolsheviki found coal on the surface, ready to be shipped, which was estimated at 100,000,000 poods. “But until the reconstruction of bridges and re-establishment of railroad communications in the Donetz territory these coal-supplies cannot be utilized.” Of course the havoc wrought by war in the Donetz Basin must be taken into account and full allowance made for it. But what is the explanation of conditions in the coal-fields of the Moscow region, which from the very first has been under Bolshevist rule, and never included in the territory of war, civil or otherwise? Says Rykov:
The fields of Moscow not only have not given what they ought to have given for the fuel-supply of Soviet Russia, but the production of coal remained in 1919 at the same level as in 1918 and it did not reach the figure of 30,000,000 poods; whereas, under the Czar at the time of the Imperialist War, the Czar’s officials, with the aid of prisoners of war, knew how to increase the production of coal in the Moscow fields to the extent of 40,000,000 poods and even more.