Projects of Mobilization of Oil Resources for the Needs of Forced Industrialization

Abstract

Using on published and unpublished documents, the problem of “searches” at the turn of the 1920s and 1930s is investigated. Mechanisms to achieve growth of oil production and oil exports to meet the needs of forced industrialization in the USSR are a central theme. The documents studied suggest that there were projects in this period that provided various options for the reorganization of the management of the oil industry and the use of mechanisms to ensure the implementation of five-year plans. While the management of Grozneft proposed strengthening cost accounting, expanding independence, and expanding the rights of each business unit and to increase the pace of technical reconstruction, representatives of the most important Azerbaijani oil region at that time insisted on the need to send significant financial resources to the government, complained about staff shortages and equipment. However, for central authorities, deficiencies in trust management seemed to be a preferable explanation for the failure to fulfill plans. The documents also indicate a very difficult situation for the Soviet oil trusts that developed on the world energy market during this period. The study concludes that projects that assumed greater independence of oil regions and an increase in government funding could not be arranged by the central government. The stake was placed on an ever-increasing centralization of management, strict submission to dictated from above plans. Their failure was accompanied by the arrests of a cohort of brilliant oil workers. Despite the repressions, a very difficult geopolitical situation, thanks to experienced specialists and previously gained positions in the world energy market, it was possible to force production and oil export of Soviet oil products. Moreover, the share of crude oil export in the late 1930s was very minor.