Evening star., 1932-07-31
BY ALEXANDER 1. NAZAROFF,


Author of 'Tolstoy. the Inconstant Genius"
TN a speech made two weeks ago be-
fore the Ukrainian Communist Con-
ference, VyacheslaV Molotov, preSi-
4 dent of the Council Of the Peoples
Commissars, warned his hearers
against neglecting agriculture for the
sake of industrial development.
"The bolSheviki must remember that
our industrial construction cannot de-
velop without the progress Of agricul-
ture," he said.
This warning and later references to
the grain situation in the Ukraine,
which last May was reported as being
100000 acres behind in its sowing
campaign, were the outgrowth OF food
crisis in Russia which has forced the
government to make radical changes in
its attitude toward the peasant farmer
and particularly toward the peasant
see the peasant freely displaying his po-
tatoes, onions, chickens and swine for
sale in the squares and bazaars of Rus
sian cities.
The right Of free trade in agricultural
products was restored with various re-
strictions) by a series of DEGREES pro-
mulgated in May and signed by Joseph
Stain, virtual dictator of Russia, and
Premier Molotov. It Is true that off,
cially the peasant never was completely
deprived of this right, and that very
limited free market never ceased to
exist in Russia: yet his private trade
was rendered almost impossible by stu
pendous taxes and all sorts of red tape.
Now, however, after three and half
years of ruthless application of "un-
compromising socialism" the Soviet
government has decided to lift this ban,
thus opening crack for bourgeois prin-
ciples in the doors of Russia's economics.
Haggard Peasant Faces.
When, on late Spring day, the first
carts drove into the Ogorodny Market,
in Moscow, the bearded, shaggy, sun
burned faces of their peasant owners
bore a truly pathetic expression. They
glanced furtiVely at the policeman sta
toned nearby. Would he arrest them
or not? Did they really have the right
to sell things? Or was the new freedom
merely a new clever trick devised by the
government to fool them once more?
Socialism had taught them at least one
thing-to be suspicious, all too sus-
picious and incredulous.
1o LIlC OAudlC 4AllCu Will Will q
dense crowd of shabby, typical Soviet
time MuskoviteS and with that noise of
SQueaking wheels, haggling voices and
bleeting, grunting and squealing animals
which had been characteristics of Rus
sian markets since times immemorial,
the buying public looked even more pa
thetic than the peasant traders-for
during these years it had been accus-
toned to buying chiefly in governmental
co-operativeS, at fixed rationS. Here,
after having bought bag Of potatoes,
an elderly woman cried with happy,
thankful tears: THANK the Lord!
Again buying without food cards, with
out waiting IN line for two hours-just
as it was in the happy old days. And
as the first market day drew to the end
and the emptied carts began to file out,
the solicitous housewives literally as
sailed the market officials with ques-
tions: will the peasants be permitted
to return tomorrow" And, hearing
reassuring Yes" they repeated their
question as though not believing their
ears.
DEGREES Seemed Impossible.
This was not unnatural In many
cities the local administrations and
police simply refused to understand the
free-trade DEGREES, SO utterly impossible
did they appear. Thus, in Taskent, when
the peasants came to the market for the
first time the police fined them 80
rubleS each and the people that gath
cred rubles each, and ordered them
all to get out as quickly as possible. In
some other cities, peasant traders were
arrested and their goods confiscated
hn 1o,,f
trained its officials in bounding private
trade that now it has to take great
pains to inculcate into their minds
and into the minds of the public-that
this crime" Of yesterday has become
q legitimate pursuit today.
In order to understand fully the
causes and the significance of this re-
form, one must look back at the his
tory of that War for Gain" which
during all of these years has been going
on between the Soviet government and
the peasants behind the official facade
of the sweeping achievements Of So
cialism," which Communists so willingly
display to foreign visitors in Moscow.
The regime of rural socialism" which
the present reform is meant to mitigate
(but not by any means to abolish) is a
direct outgrowth of the five-year plan.
RusiSa's "break-neck speed indus
trialization" under this plan REQUIRES
cash. A great deal of it, Yet the
credits which the Soviet government
receives abroad are relatively small
Hence the erection of new industrial
giants" can be financed cnly. first. by
the atrocious underpayment Of the
Russian workmea and, second (chieflv)
by the pumping out Of grain" from the
villages. Such, in brief, is the essence
of the theory and practice of "tighten-
ing ones belt" which Soviet econo-
miSts often have formulated. In this
sense, the flve-year plan is a colossal
scheme Of flve-year hunger cure,
Hunger Cures Distrusted.
But the peasant always has known too
much about hunger to be believer in
hunger cures. To lay hand on his grain
proved difficult task indeed.