Lend-Lease in the years of the Second World War. Lend-Lease: Getting Rid of the Lies of Soviet Propaganda

Let's start with the fact that the USSR paid with gold for pre-lend-lease, as well as for goods and materials purchased from the allies, except for lend-lease. On the part of modern Russian forum "specialists" it is argued that the USSR paid with gold for Lend-Lease after 1941, without making a difference between Lend-Lease proper and pre-Lend-Lease, and also quite deliberately omitting the fact that the Soviet Union in during the war, purchases were made outside the framework of Lend-Lease. As an example of their correctness, such "specialists" of a wide profile cite the sunken British cruiser "Edinburgh" carrying about 5.5 tons of gold in 1942. And, as they claim, it was the payment of the USSR to the allies for the received military equipment under Lend-Lease.

But the fact is that after that, on the part of such “specialists”, deathly silence sets in. Why? Yes, because the USSR could not pay with gold for Lend-Lease supplies in 1942 - the Lend-Lease agreement assumed that material and technical assistance would be supplied to the Soviet side with a deferred payment. 465 bars of gold with a total weight of 5536 kilograms, loaded onto the Edinburgh cruiser in Murmansk in April 1942, were the payment of the Soviet Union to England for weapons supplied in excess of the list stipulated by the Lend-Lease agreement.

But it turned out that this gold did not reach England. The cruiser Edinburgh was damaged and scuttled. And, the Soviet Union, even during the war years, received insurance in the amount of 32.32% of the value of gold, paid by the British War Risk Insurance Bureau. By the way, all the transported gold, the notorious 5.5 tons, at the prices of that time cost a little more than 100 million dollars.

Compare with the total amount of lend-lease assistance of 10 billion dollars, which, of course, they don’t like to talk about in the USSR or Russia, but at the same time, making big eyes, they vaguely hint that it was just an astronomical amount.

However, the story of Edinburgh's gold did not end there.

In 1981, the British treasure-hunting company Jesson Marine Recoveries entered into an agreement with the authorities of the USSR and Great Britain on the search and recovery of gold. "Edinburgh" lay at a depth of 250 meters. In the most difficult conditions, divers managed to lift 5129 kg. According to the agreement, 2/3 of the gold was received by the USSR, 1/3 - by Great Britain. Minus payment to the company for the operation to raise gold.

Thus, not only was the gold transported by Edinburgh not a payment for Lend-Lease, not only did this gold never reach the Allies, and a third of its value was reimbursed by the USSR during the war years, so even later forty years, when this gold was raised, most of it was returned to the USSR.

What is most interesting and deserving of the closest attention is whose gold was it that the USSR paid with its allies?

Following simple logic, we have the right to think that the USSR could pay with its own and only its own gold. And nothing else. But, as they say, it is not so. And the point here is the following - during civil war in Spain, on October 15, 1936, Caballero and Negrin formally asked the Soviet Union to accept for storage approximately 500 tons of gold.

And already on February 15, 1937, an act was signed on the acceptance of 510.07 tons of Spanish gold, which was melted down into gold bars with a Soviet stamp. Did Spain get their gold back? No. Therefore, even the gold that the Soviet Union paid off during the Second World War with its allies, most likely ... was Spanish. Which very well characterizes the worker-peasant power of the country of the Soviets.

Someone can say that these are mere speculations and the Soviet leadership is the most honest, the most international, and only thinks about how it would help all those in need in the world. Approximately this is how help is given to the Republicans in Spain during the Civil War. The USSR helped, then it helped, but not disinterestedly. When it came to money, all the capitalists of the world simply wept with envy, seeing how the USSR provided "gratuitous and disinterested" assistance to the revolutionary workers and peasants in Spain.

So Moscow billed Spain for the placement and storage of gold reserves, the services of Soviet advisers, pilots, tankers, translators and mechanics. The expenses for the round-trip travel of Soviet military personnel and their families, the payment of daily allowances, salaries, the costs of accommodation, maintenance, treatment in hospitals and vacations of Soviet military personnel and their families, burial expenses and allowances for military widows, training of Spanish pilots were taken into account. in the Soviet Union, the construction and re-equipment of airfields in the territory controlled by the Republicans, where training flights took place. All this was paid for with Spanish gold.

For example, the total amount supplied from the USSR from September 1936 to July 1938, only the material part, amounted to 166,835,023 dollars. And for all shipments to Spain from October 1936 to August 1938, the republican authorities paid in full the entire amount owed to the Soviet Union in 171,236,088 dollars.

Adding the cost of military equipment sent in late 1938 - early 1939 to Spain from Murmansk via France ($55,359,660), we get the total cost of military-technical supplies. It varies from 222,194,683 to 226,595,748 dollars. Due to the fact that the cargo of the last delivery was not completely delivered to its destination and part of it was returned to Soviet military warehouses, the final figure for the cost of military cargo delivered to Republican Spain is 202 .4 million dollars

So really, after the USSR “pocketed” Spanish gold and provided “disinterested” assistance to the Republicans, will it behave with the Americans and the British, in matters of paying for Lend-Lease and other assistance received, in some other way? No. Further, this will be demonstrated with a specific example.

How the USSR returned equipment and equipment to the allies.

It is enough to simply quote a number of Soviet documents that were exchanged between the Soviet and American sides during negotiations on the settlement of issues related to the payment of Lend-Lease after the war. But for starters, it’s better to cite an excerpt from the memorandum of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the USSR Gromyko A.A., from which it becomes clear why it is the Soviet side that everyone possible ways hid from her former allies the amount of surviving equipment and equipment:

Memorandum of the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the USSR A.A. Gromyko to the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR I.V. Stalin about negotiations with the Americans on the settlement of settlements on Lend-Lease

“If the negotiations proceed from the above calculations of the global amount of compensation, based on the size of the balances of Lend-Lease deliveries to the USSR, we would have to inform the Americans of information about the presence of such balances in us, which is undesirable for the following reasons: the Americans may then require us to decipher residues by individual groups, in particular by equipment. Having received from us this kind of information about the remains of civilian items, the Americans can, referring to Article V of the Agreement of June 11, 1942, present us with a demand for the return of the items most valuable to us.

Thus, Stalin and the Soviet party leadership, after the war, tried by all means to avoid the return of borrowed machinery and equipment. That is why until now all researchers are faced with the following problem - it is known how much equipment, weapons and equipment were supplied to the USSR by the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition and for what approximate amount, but there is no exact data on the amount of all the remaining equipment and equipment after the end of World War II war with the Soviet Union, which he had to return.

Therefore, on the one hand, the Soviet Union did not return the technology and equipment itself, and even more so, did not pay a single penny to the allies for it. And propagandists, both then in the USSR and today in Russia, received a convenient argument, arguing that the help of the allies in the Lend-Lease war was insignificant.

Although, knowing that the USSR hid data on the amount of aid received, we have the right to believe the American and British data on the amount of all equipment, weapons and materials delivered to the USSR and, based on these data, draw conclusions about how much this received by land -lease aid helped the USSR in the war against Germany.

As an example of such concealment of data and deliberate machinations on the part of the Soviet leadership, one can cite excerpts from the diary of Soviet-American negotiations on the settlement of unresolved issues of Lend-Lease (Washington) held on 01/13/1950.

“As for the factories supplied under Lend-Lease, Panyushkin asked Wylie if he meant the factory equipment supplied on account of the loan agreement of October 15, 1945.

To this, Wylie replied that these were the plants that were supplied to the Soviet Union under Lend-Lease, but were not used for military purposes.

In response to this, Panyushkin said that during the war there are no factories that would not have anything to do with the war.

How "gracefully" the Soviet leadership crossed out entire factories from the list of payment or return!!! It simply stated that all the equipment used in the USSR was related to the war, and therefore is not civilian equipment that would have to be returned under the terms of Lend-Lease, and if it is recognized as such and the USSR reports its unsuitability, then in addition for this equipment under the terms of Lend-Lease, the Soviet leadership does not have to pay!

And so on throughout the list of military equipment, equipment or materials. And, if the USSR was able to keep entire factories for itself, then it’s not worth talking about some: cars, planes, ships or machine tools. All this became sharply Soviet.

And, if the Americans nevertheless showed persistence in the issue with some item of equipment or equipment, then the Soviet side dragged out the negotiation processes in every possible way, underestimated the cost of this item or simply declared it unsuitable, and therefore not mandatory for return.

Author - Mark Semyonovich Solonin (b. May 29, 1958, Kuibyshev) - Russian publicist, author of books and articles in the genre of historical revisionism, dedicated to the Great Patriotic war, in the first place - its initial period. He is an aeronautical engineer by education.

Guns, oil, gold

The article was published (with small, purely technical cuts) on September 28, 2010 in the weekly "Military Industrial Courier". I bring my sincere gratitude to all the participants in the discussion of the note "Beyond the Limit", whose interesting and informative messages largely determined the content and topics of this article.

On September 29, 1941, a conference of representatives of the USSR, the USA and Great Britain began in Moscow, during which fundamental decisions were made on large-scale deliveries of weapons and military equipment to the Soviet Union. On October 1, the first (there will be four in total) protocol on deliveries in the amount of $ 1 billion over 9 months was signed. Thus began the history of American Lend-Lease for the USSR. Deliveries of various materials for military and civilian purposes continued until September 1945. In total, 17.3 million tons of property worth $9.48 billion were delivered to the Soviet Union (mainly from the USA). Taking into account the work and services performed, the total cost of lend-lease in the USSR amounted to 11 billion dollars. Dollars of the early 40s, when one thousand greenbacks could buy a weighty bar of 850 grams of gold.

FOUR PERCENT

Is it a lot - 17 million tons of goods with a total value of 7 thousand tons of pure gold? What is the real contribution of lend-lease deliveries to the equipment of the Red Army, to the work of the national economy of the USSR? The best Soviet economists have studied this question deeply and comprehensively and have given it an exhaustive, short and precise answer. The answer was published in 1947 in the book "The Military Economy of the USSR during the Second World War", which was published signed by a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, deputy head of the government of the USSR (i.e. Stalin's deputy), permanent (since 1938) ) head of the State Planning Committee of the USSR, doctor economic sciences, Academician N.A. Voznesensky. Four percent. Only four percent of Soviet industry's own production came from these miserable American handouts. It would be something to argue about - the size economic aid allies turned out to be within the margin of error of economic statistics.

Two years later, in October 1949, N.A. Voznesensky was arrested. The investigation of the so-called. The "Leningrad case" lasted almost a year. The best security officers, highly experienced Soviet investigators revealed the insidious plans of the inveterate enemies of the people. The military collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR, having thoroughly studied the materials of the case, having familiarized itself with irrefutable evidence of the guilt of the conspirators, sentenced N.A. Voznesensky, A.A. Kuznetsov, P.S. Popkov, M.I. Rodionov and others to be shot. On April 30, 1954, the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR rehabilitated Voznesensky, Kuznetsov, Popkov, Rodionov and others. It turned out that the "Leningrad case" was fabricated from beginning to end, the "evidence" of guilt was grossly falsified, lawless reprisals took place under the guise of a "court", the accusations were dictated by the political task of the opposing clans surrounded by Stalin. The death sentence was recognized as a mistake. Unfortunately, no one bothered to officially recognize as a "mistake" the insane four percent that appeared in Voznesensky's book in accordance with the instructions of the political leadership of the USSR, which at that time was preoccupied with fanning the flames of the Cold War.

There was no economic calculation behind these notorious "four percent" from the very beginning, and how could the ratio of the volumes of a huge range of goods be expressed in a single number? Of course, it was for this purpose that money and prices were invented, but in the conditions of the Soviet economy, prices were set by directive, without any connection with the completely absent market, and were calculated in non-convertible rubles. Finally, war and the war economy have their own laws - is it possible to estimate the cost of flour delivered to besieged Leningrad, just multiplying the weight in tons by pre-war prices? At what price should hundreds of thousands of saved human lives be measured? And how much do a barrel of water and an iron bucket cost on a fire? The Soviet Union received about 3 thousand km of fire hose under Lend-Lease. How much does it cost in a war? Even in those cases when Lend-Lease deliveries amounted to meager fractions of a percent of the mass-dimensional volumes of Soviet production, they real value in a war could be huge. "Small spool but precious". 903 thousand detonators, 150 thousand insulators, 15 thousand binoculars and 6199 sets of semi-automatic anti-aircraft sights - is that a lot or a little?

The Americans supplied the USSR with 9,100 tons of molybdenum concentrate for a "miserable" amount of $10 million (one thousandth of the total cost of Lend-Lease goods). On the scale of Soviet metallurgy, where the bill went to millions of tons, 9.1 thousand tons is an insignificant trifle, but without this "trifle" high-strength structural steel cannot be smelted. And in the endless lists of lend-lease supplies, not only molybdenum concentrate - there are also 34.5 thousand tons of metallic zinc, 7.3 thousand tons of ferro-silicon, 3.3 thousand tons of ferro-chromium, 460 tons of ferro-vanadium , 370 tons of metallic cobalt. And also nickel, tungsten, zirconium, cadmium, beryllium, 12 tons of precious cesium ... 9570 tons of graphite electrodes and 673 tons (i.e. thousands of kilometers!) nichrome wire, without which the production of electric heaters and furnaces will stop. And another 48.5 thousand tons of electrodes for galvanic baths. Statistical data on the production of non-ferrous metals in the USSR remained strictly classified for half a century. This circumstance does not allow a correct assessment of the value of those hundreds of thousands of tons of aluminum and copper that were supplied under Lend-Lease. However, even the most "patriotic" authors agree that Lend-Lease covered up to half of the needs of Soviet industry - and this is without taking into account the enormous amount of American electrical wires and cables supplied ready-made.

Endless rows are the figures for the supply of a variety of chemicals. Some of them were not supplied in "spool" volumes: 1.2 thousand tons of ethyl alcohol, 1.5 thousand tons of acetone, 16.5 thousand tons of phenol, 25 thousand tons of methyl alcohol, 1 million liters of slurry. .. Particular attention should be paid to 12 thousand tons of ethylene glycol - with this amount of antifreeze it was possible to fill about 250 thousand powerful aircraft engines. But, of course, explosives became the main component of Lend-Lease "chemistry": 46 thousand tons of dynamite, 140 thousand tons of smokeless gunpowder, 146 thousand tons of TNT. According to the most conservative estimates, Lend-Lease supplies covered one third of the needs of the Red Army (and this estimate does not yet take into account the share of imported components used for the production of explosives in Soviet factories). In addition, 603 million rifle-caliber cartridges, 522 million large-caliber cartridges, 3 million shells for 20-mm air guns, 18 million shells for 37-mm and 40-mm anti-aircraft guns were received from America in "ready form".

By the way, anti-aircraft guns were also supplied from the USA - about 8 thousand small-caliber anti-aircraft guns (a significant part of which were installed on the chassis of a light armored personnel carrier), which amounted to 35% of the total MZA resource received by the Red Army during the war years. Within the same limits (at least one third of the total resource), the share of imports is also estimated. car tires and chemical raw materials (natural and synthetic rubber) for their production.

DECISIVE CONTRIBUTION

It is not at all difficult to find positions for which lend-lease deliveries turned out to be larger than our own Soviet production. And it's not just cars. off-road(the famous Jeeps, 50,000 units delivered), all-wheel drive trucks (the equally famous Studebakers, 104,000 units delivered), motorcycles (35,000), armored personnel carriers (7,200), amphibious vehicles ( 3.5 thousand). No matter how great the role of American automotive technology (in total, more than 375 thousand trucks alone were delivered) - improbably reliable in comparison with domestic "gas" and "Zies" - deliveries of railway rolling stock were much more important.

The technology of warfare in the mid-20th century was based on the use of colossal amounts of ammunition. The theory and practice of the "artillery offensive" (which remains the legitimate pride of Soviet military science) involved the expenditure of many thousands of tons of ammunition per day. Such volumes in that era could only be transported by rail, and the locomotive became a weapon no less important (albeit unfairly forgotten by the public and journalists) than a tank. The USSR received 1911 steam locomotives and 70 diesel locomotives, 11.2 thousand wagons under Lend-Lease various types, 94 thousand tons of wheels, axles and wheelsets.

The American supplies were so huge that they made it possible to practically curtail own production rolling stock - in four years (1942-1945) only 92 steam locomotives and a little more than 1 thousand wagons were produced; the released production capacities were loaded with the production of military equipment (in particular, the Ural Carriage Works in Nizhny Tagil became one of the main manufacturers of the T-34 tank). To complete the picture, it remains only to recall the 620,000 tons of railway rails delivered under Lend-Lease.

It is difficult to overestimate the role of Lend-Lease in re-equipping (quantitatively and qualitatively) the Soviet Armed Forces with radio communications. 2,379 complete on-board radios, 6,900 radio transmitters, 1,000 radio compasses, 12,400 headphones and laryngophones - and that's just for aviation. 15.8 thousand tank radio stations. More than 29 thousand various radio stations for the ground forces, including 2092 high-power (400 W) SCR-399 radio stations installed on the Studebaker chassis, which provided communication in the corps-army-front link, and another 400 of the same radio stations, but no car. To provide radio communications in tactical level(regiment-division) 11.5 thousand SCR-284 portable radio stations and 12.6 thousand V-100 Pilot radios were delivered (the latter were supplied with inscriptions and scales in Russian at the factory).

The simple, reliable and noise-proof wired communication- 619 thousand telephone sets, 200 thousand headphones, 619 telegraph stations, 569 teletypes and an absolutely astronomical amount of telephone wire (1.9 million km) were delivered to the USSR. As well as 4.6 million dry batteries, 314 diesel generators, 21,000 battery charging stations, tens of thousands of various instrumentation, including 1,340 oscilloscopes. And another 10 million radio tubes, 170 ground and 370 airborne (!!!) radars. American radio stations regularly served in national economy USSR, in the river and sea fleet until the 60s, and the Soviet radio industry for at least 10 years ahead was provided with samples for study, development and unlicensed copying.

Such lists can be listed for a long time, but nevertheless, in terms of importance, I would put the provision of the Soviet Air Force with aviation gasoline (however, even in terms of tonnage, this category was in first place).

On the eve of the war, the situation with the provision of aviation with fuel passed from the stage of a "gasoline crisis" into a "gasoline catastrophe". New aircraft engines, boosted in terms of compression and supercharging, required gasoline with a higher octane rating than the B-70, which was produced in significant quantities. The planned (and actually not achieved in 1941) volume of production of high-octane gasolines B-74 and B-78 * (450 thousand tons) was only 12% of the mobilization request of NGOs (for B-78 it was 7.5%). The country, which at that time had the largest oil production in the entire Old World, kept its aviation on the strictest "starvation ration". The outbreak of the war did not improve the situation at all - a large amount of gasoline was lost in blown up warehouses in the western military districts, and after it was released in the summer of 1942, gasoline was completely destroyed. German troops to the foothills of the Caucasus, the evacuation of the Baku oil refineries further exacerbated the crisis.

* Contrary to popular misconception, the numbers in the brand designation of aviation gasoline are not equal to its octane number. Gasoline B-74 had an octane number determined by the "motor method" equal to 91, gasoline B-78 had an octane number of 93. For comparison, it is worth noting that the best Russian motor gasoline AI-98 has an octane number of 89.

Soviet aviation, however, flew and fought. In total, during the war, 3 million tons of high-octane aviation gasoline (2.998 thousand tons - to be exact) were spent (for all needs and by all departments) Where did it come from? 720 thousand tons are directly imported. Another 1,117 thousand tons of aviation gasoline was obtained by mixing imported high-octane (with an octane number from 95 to 100) components with Soviet-made low-octane gasoline. The remaining 1,161 thousand tons of aviation gasoline (slightly more than one third of the total resource) were produced by Baku factories. True, they produced this gasoline using Lend-Lease tetraethyl lead, which was obtained in the amount of 6.3 thousand tons. It would not be a big exaggeration to say that without the help of the Allies, the Red Star aircraft would have had to stand the whole war on the ground.

LEND-LEASE IN THE HUMAN DIMENSION

People's Commissar of the aviation industry Shakhurin in his memoirs talks about such an episode of the war. At one of the three main aircraft engine plants, the implementation of the plan was systematically disrupted. Arriving at the plant, Shakhurin found out that production was limited to the work of two highly qualified turners, who could be entrusted with boring the engine crankshafts; These workers could hardly stand on their feet because of hunger. The high Moscow boss successfully solved the problem, and from a certain “special base of the regional executive committee” a reinforced special ration was allocated for two people. Lend-Lease solved the same problem, but on a different scale.

238 million kg of frozen beef and pork, 218 million kg of canned meat (including 75 million kg marked as "tushenka"), 33 million kg of sausages and bacon, 1.089 million kg of chicken meat, 110 million kg of egg powder, 359 million kg vegetable oil and margarine, 99 million kg of butter, 36 million kg of cheese, 72 million kg of powdered milk... It was not by chance that I cited the volumes of Lend-Lease food supplies in precisely such strange units of measurement (“millions of kilograms”). So it is easier to divide by the number of possible consumers. For example, during the entire war, 22 million wounded were admitted to hospitals. This means that it was theoretically possible to spend 4.5 kg of butter, 1.6 kg of cheese, 3.3 kg of powdered milk, 60 kg of meat to feed each of them (of course, stew is not included in this list - this is for a sick person not food). I trust our esteemed veterans to compare these lists with the real diet of military hospitals ...

Full and plentiful nutrition is, of course, an important condition for the recovery of the wounded, but first of all, the hospital needs medicines, surgical instruments, syringes, needles and suture thread, chloroform for anesthesia, various medical devices. With all these, we were not bad, but very bad.

On the eve of the war, huge volumes of military medical equipment were concentrated in the border districts (there were more than 40 million individual dressing packages there alone). Most of it stayed there. The loss and / or evacuation of most of the pharmaceutical industry enterprises led to the fact that by the end of 1941 production volumes had fallen to 8.5% of the pre-war level - and this despite the fact that the situation required a multiple increase in the production of medicines. Used bandages were washed in hospitals; doctors had to work without such vital drugs as ether and morphine for anesthesia, streptocide, novocaine, glucose, pyryramidone and aspirin.

The life and health of millions of wounded was saved by medical lend-lease - another carefully forgotten page in the history of the war. In general, allied supplies provided up to 80% of the needs of the Soviet military medical service. Only in 1944, only 40 million grams of streptocide were obtained. American antibiotics and sulfonamides have become an invaluable treasure. And at what price can one measure the one million kg of vitamins supplied to the USSR? Lend-Lease surgical instruments, X-ray machines, and laboratory microscopes served well for many years during and after the war. Yes, and 13.5 million pairs of leather army boots, 2 million sets of underwear, 2.8 million leather belts, 1.5 million woolen blankets to supply the Red Army were not superfluous ...

"SVOBODA" CARAVANS

The Soviet Union and the United States were not close neighbors. Accordingly, all these millions of tons of goods, including many hundreds of thousands of tons of explosives that fly into the air from the very first fragment of an air bomb (and no less flammable and explosive aviation gasoline), had to be delivered to the ports of the USSR across the vast expanses of the world ocean. Soviet navy was able to transport only 19.4% of this gigantic tonnage; everything else the allies delivered themselves.

To solve this task, unprecedented in scale and complexity, an equally unprecedented means was found - the Americans were able to organize high-speed mass production of ocean-going vessels of the Liberty (Freedom) series. The figures characterizing the Liberty construction program cannot but stagger the imagination. Huge ocean-going ships with a displacement of 14.5 thousand tons (length 135 m, carrying capacity 9.14 thousand tons) were built in the amount of 2750 units. Average duration the construction of one vessel was brought to 44 days. And this is an average - in November 1942, the ship of this series "Robert Peary" was launched 4 days, 15 hours and 29 minutes after the moment of laying.

The main feature of the ships of the Liberty series (it was this that made it possible to achieve phenomenal rates of production) was the replacement of riveting by welding. It was believed that the resource of such ships would be very low, but in a war it was decided to neglect this. However, "Freedom" turned out to be surprisingly tenacious - "welded ships" sailed the seas for decades; so, the Robert Pirie mentioned above was in operation until 1963, and even at the beginning of the 21st century, at least three Liberties were still in service!

The task was by no means exhausted by the ultra-fast construction of a huge number of ships. In Berlin, too, they understood the military significance of these endless caravans of ships with aviation gasoline, weapons and ammunition, and tried to take their own countermeasures. Piloting ships through the waters of the North Atlantic (about a third of all cargo was delivered by this "Murmansk" route), swarming with German submarines, under the gunpoint of German bombers, who received all the airfields of Norway for their base, became, in fact, a strategic naval campaign scale. And the allies won this campaign with brilliance - even in the "Murmansk direction" only 7% of the tonnage was lost; caravans heading to the ports of Iran or the Soviet Far East, lost no more than 1%.

Everything is relative. What can we compare the naval miracle performed by the Allies? It is possible with the history of the "blockade" of Leningrad, when the delivery of several barges with food a day across Lake Ladoga - and this is at a distance of 50-80 km, and not 5 thousand nautical miles - has become an almost insoluble problem. It is possible with the history of the ill-fated "Tallinn crossing", when the Red Banner Baltic Fleet, on its way 400 km from Tallinn to Leningrad, having not met a single German submarine at sea, not a single enemy ship of the destroyer class and above, lost 57% of the escorted civil courts. It is possible (although it is better not to do this) to recall the history of the months-long defense of Sevastopol, when the Black Sea Fleet - again, having practically no enemy worthy of mention at sea - could neither ensure an uninterrupted supply of ground forces fighting for the city, nor evacuate the last surviving defenders of Sevastopol ( from 15 to 20 thousand people, including at least 5 thousand wounded, were simply abandoned to the mercy of the enemy)

"Absolutely shameless and cynical..."

And after all this, on September 1, 2010, on the next anniversary of the start of World War II, on the state (which in this case very important) TV channel "Culture" gives a big lecture Dr. historical sciences, corresponding member Russian Academy Sciences (RAS), Director of the Institute Russian history RAS comrade A.N. Sakharov, and he says these words: “It was agreed that the United States and other allied countries would provide great assistance to the Soviet Union under the so-called lend-lease system ... America demanded payment in gold, and not ever, but already in the course of military operations, during the war itself. In this sense, the Americans knew how to count money and were in this sense completely shameless and cynical. Everything that was demanded, everything was paid for, including gold ... "

Even if these shameless and cynical lies were true, we should thank the Americans for their invaluable help. This is a huge success - during a destructive war, when the fate of the country hung in the balance, to find a supplier who, in exchange for stupid soft metal (you can’t make a simple one out of gold and a bayonet), will sell millions of tons of military equipment at normal (and not “blockade”) prices. property, food, gasoline and medicines. Moreover, he himself will bring three-quarters of this cargo from the other side of the globe.

However, a lie remains a lie - in accordance with the terms of Lend-Lease, neither the ruble, nor the dollar, nor the cent was paid during the war. After the end of hostilities, most of what was delivered was simply written off as property spent during the war. At the negotiations in 1948-1951. the Americans billed $0.8 billion, less than one-tenth of the total value of the goods delivered. The Soviet side agreed to recognize only 0.3 billion. However, to recognize the debt and return it are two big differences. A long, decades-long history of disputes and squabbles ended with the fact that at the moment no more than one percent of Lend-Lease deliveries has been paid (taking into account dollar inflation).

Russia is still paying under Lend-Lease

Despite the fact that the war ended 67 years ago, and Lend-Lease deliveries stopped with it, we still have not paid off with the United States for military equipment and weapons, food and equipment, spare parts and fuel and lubricants ... The final maturity of our debt - 2030.

How can it be?

In fairness, we note that the prosperous paid off her Lend-Lease debt to Canada only on December 29, 2006. So, maybe those who believe Lend-Lease are right bondage, the share of deliveries in the total volume is insignificant, and the received samples of equipment and weapons are outdated?

Paid in blood

The Lend-Lease Act was passed by the US Congress on March 11, 1941. According to it, America transferred ammunition, equipment, food and strategic raw materials, including oil products, to its allies in World War II. It was assumed that “the supplied materials (machines, various military equipment, weapons, raw materials, other items) destroyed, lost and used during the war are not subject to payment. Should have paid just for that, which remained intact after the war and could be used by the recipient countries. Thus, there were no Lend-Lease payments during the war. True, there was some kind of cunning "reverse Lend-Lease" scheme, according to which USSR sent to gold, platinum, wood, manganese and chrome ores, etc. More like barter, but this is a casuistry of international treaties.

After the end of the war, the volume of US Lend-Lease deliveries to the USSR was determined: it amounted to 11.3 billion US dollars. (According to other sources - about 10 billion dollars.) The Americans asked to partially pay for civilian supplies that were in warehouses on September 2, 1945. Since the USSR did not disclose its inventory data, the Americans estimated these deliveries at $2.6 billion, and cut that amount in half a year later. But, as Stalin said, "The USSR fully paid off its Lend-Lease debts with blood".

China won't pay

By the summer of 1941, a very tense situation had developed in Iran. Considering that Hitler planned a campaign against India with a successive capture of the Middle Eastern countries, Iran was flooded with German agents. On July 25, British troops entered Iran from the south, and Soviet troops from the north, and at the same time eliminated the entire known intelligence network of Germany.

In preparation for receiving Lend-Lease cargo, the ports in Khorramshahr, Bandar Shahpur and Basra were reconstructed, large aircraft and automobile assembly plants, field warehouses for picking and handling cargo were built on the shores of the Persian Gulf. The Allies also modernized the highways and railways they needed, and built airfields. First of all, the railway from the Persian Gulf to Tehran was reconstructed and a modern paved highway, stations Maintenance. Hundreds of diesel locomotives, thousands of freight wagons and platforms, as well as trucks were delivered from and.

At first, aircraft were assembled in Margil and Shuaiba, and after the creation of an air base in Abadan, 2 Soviet air regiments were formed for the transfer, staffed by experienced front-line pilots. Some of the cars were sent disassembled and assembled already in the USSR.

A group of American military specialists sent to was led by the Russians. Controlled transportation by the southern route, none other than Anastas Ivanovich Mikoyan - Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR. On the assembly plants local residents worked - Arabs and Persians, the administration consisted of Americans and British, and Soviet military specialists accepted the products.

In March 1943, the Americans took over the supervision of the Trans-Iranian Railway and the ports of the Persian Gulf. Since the middle of the year, assembly plants have been operating in the towns of Ash-Shuaiba (southwest of Basra, Iraq) and Andimeshk, on the Trans-Iranian Railway. Immediately the flow increased - up to 10,000 cars per month began to arrive from the south. Only the car assembly plant in Andimeshk sent about 78,000 cars to the USSR - that's what American mass production technology means! All in all, we received two-thirds of Lend-Lease vehicles by the southern route.

However, the trans-Iranian route, like the Arctic convoys, had its drawbacks: firstly, it was too long (the route of the convoy from the coast of Iran around the South African Cape of Good Hope took about 75 days, and then it also took time to pass the cargo along Iran and the Caucasus or the Caspian). Secondly, German aviation interfered with shipping in the Caspian. With the removal of the front from the borders of the USSR, this route lost its significance, and in 1945 Lend-Lease cargo went through the Black Sea.

I would like to end with an excerpt from the article Wilson, professor at the University of Kansas: “What America experienced during the war is fundamentally different from the trials that befell its main allies. Only the Americans could name "good war", because it helped to significantly raise the standard of living and demanded too few sacrifices from the vast majority of the population ... "

Literally "loan-lease") - a system for the transfer by the United States on loan or on lease of weapons, military and other materials necessary for waging war to allied countries during the Second World War. Convinced by the experience of the First World War that the supply of military materials to the Allies on the basis of a loan does not provide a sufficiently profitable compensation, the United States during the Second World War decided to introduce another system, the idea of ​​which belonged to President F. Roosevelt (see) and which, according to him, was not supposed to be a "debit and credit system", but a system of mutual military supply. In January 1941, Roosevelt came up with a proposal to create a L. system, and, despite the opposition of the isolationists, the US Congress on March 11, 1941, by an overwhelming majority of votes, passed the L. Law. . The L. Act gave the president the authority to sell, transfer, trade, rent, loan, or otherwise, military material or military information to the government of any country whose defense the president deemed essential to the security of the United States. The term of office of the President of the United States for the supply of materials and the provision of services was initially determined until June 30, 1943, then annually extended, with the last term set until June 30, 1946. However, already on August 21, 1945, the US government announced the termination of supplies for L. In fact they were discontinued in September 1945 to all countries, with the exception of the Kuomintang government of China, supplies to which continued in the future, being one of the most important means of American intervention in China. After the adoption of the law on L., the US government concluded with the countries that received aid on L. "basic agreements on lend-lease" and "agreements on mutual assistance." The amount of Lend-Lease deliveries in 1941-45, on average, amounted to only 15% of the total amount of US military spending and over 50% of US exports. The agreements concluded by the United States with certain countries that received Lend-Lease materials established the following basic principles for settling accounts for L.: 1. Materials destroyed, lost, and consumed during the war are not subject to any payment. 2. Materials remaining after the end of the war and suitable for civilian needs are paid in whole or in part in the form of a long-term loan. 3. Military materials remain in the countries that received them, but the US government reserves the right to reclaim these materials. At the same time, the US government says it will generally not exercise this right. 4. Equipment not completed by the end of the war and lend-lease materials in the warehouses of US government agencies can be purchased by the countries for which they are ordered, with the US government providing long-term credit to pay for such materials and equipment. According to the agreement between the United States and England of December 6, 1945 on the settlement of relations arising from L. , England undertook to pay $532 million for Lend-Lease materials and surplus property belonging to the United States left after the war, as well as for US installations on the territory of the United Kingdom. In addition, Britain pledged to pay $118 million as the difference between the value of mutual deliveries of goods and services provided by the US and British governments through the Latvian system after the victory over Japan. The total amount of 650 million dollars is payable by England within 50 years from December 31, 1951 equal parts annually with accrual from 1951 percent at a rate of 2% per annum. The importance of the assistance provided during the war in L. should not be exaggerated. In particular Soviet army, which played a decisive role in the defeat of Nazi Germany, received immeasurable large quantity tanks, aircraft, guns and other types of weapons than from the USA according to L. Specific gravity supplies of industrial goods by the allies to the USSR in relation to the size of production industrial products in the socialist enterprises of the USSR during the period of the war economy amounted to only about 4%. The enormous material losses suffered by the Soviet Union, which bore the brunt of the struggle against Hitlerite Germany and its allies, were in no way compensated for by the help received from the United States in the Leningrad region. british empire, although the role of the latter in the war could not be compared with the role of the Soviet Union. Although Roosevelt declared that the only important benefit that the United States would receive from deliveries along the L. was assistance in the speedy defeat of Germany and Japan, in fact L. facilitated the US's economic penetration into the countries of Europe and Asia. L. to a large extent contributed to the expansion of US production during the war years by increasing government military orders for the supply of weapons to the allies. Therefore, the L. system strengthened the expansionist tendencies in the USA, since American goods did not find sufficient domestic markets after the war because of the decline in the standard of living of the broad masses of the US population. Both during the war and especially after its end, significant deviations from the goals for which it was formally introduced took place in the L. system. Even during the war years, the United States delivered deliveries through Latvia to countries that not only were not part of the anti-Hitler coalition, but, on the contrary, supported Germany (for example, Turkey). After the Second World War, the US government used L. for openly reactionary purposes, continuing to supply weapons and other materials to the government of Chiang Kai-shek to fight against the democratic forces of China. In relation to England, France, and other capitalist countries, L. contributed to their economic and even political subordination to the United States, which manifested itself both in the settlement of settlements on L., and especially in the course of the implementation of the "Marshall Plan" by the USA. On October 15, 1945, the Soviet Union and the United States concluded an agreement on the supply of equipment, in the form of a long-term credit to the Soviet Union by the United States, which was available or ordered for Leningrad, but not delivered by that time, for a total amount of 244 million dollars. In December 1946 The United States unilaterally stopped supplying equipment to the USSR under this agreement, thus violating its obligations.

Lend-Lease is a program under which the United States provided its allies in World War II with everything they needed - weapons, food, production equipment and raw materials.

Most often, however, under "lend-lease" is understood precisely the supply of weapons, not paying attention to other goods.

Causes and conditions

The American leadership reasonably believed that in World War II, those countries whose defense was of vital importance to the United States should be helped.

Initially, the Lend-Lease program included China and the British Empire, but then other countries, including the USSR, joined it.

Adopted in March 1941, the Lend-Lease Law established the following supply rules:

• Equipment, weapons, food, materials and other goods used or destroyed during the war were not subject to payment.
• The goods left after the war, if they could be suitable for civilian purposes, were paid for on the basis of loans provided by the United States.
• If the United States is interested in returning this or that product after the war, it must be returned.

Thus, the supplies were a kind of "gift" to the allies during the war, and in peacetime they turned into a commodity and could be bought at quite reasonable prices.

Lend-Lease in the USSR

Lend-lease in the USSR is still the subject of fierce disputes between opponents and supporters of Soviet power. The former claim that without American supplies, the USSR is unlikely to have won the war, while the latter argue that the supplies were insignificant and did not play a special role in the fight against fascism.

Both of them are gravely mistaken. The Western "superpower" organized large-scale deliveries of weapons and other goods to European countries due to the fact that the US GDP was several times higher than this indicator in any developed European country, including the USSR.

Hundreds of thousands of tons of cargo were imported into the Soviet Union. More than 12 percent of the tanks and aircraft available in the Red Army were of American and British production, and armored personnel carriers were entirely imported: in our country, such equipment has not yet been produced.

But there were such lend-lease and weak spots. First, the agreements on the supply of weapons and equipment were not fully implemented. Of the 800 aircraft and 1,000 tanks destined for the USSR in 1941, only 669 aircraft and 487 tanks were sent. The situation more or less normalized only in 1943.

Secondly, a large amount of foreign aid to the Soviet Union did not mean best quality. And here the point is not only that the United States deliberately supplied not the most modern and best of its equipment, but also that American military production generally lagged behind Soviet and European.

The USSR and Germany at that time invested most of their production forces in the development of weapons, including tanks, as a result of which they surpassed all other states in this; therefore, against the background of Soviet and German technology, American and even British technology often looked weak.

A more acceptable situation was with the supply of aircraft, less acceptable - tanks. The share of anti-tank and anti-aircraft guns was very small, since the USSR had enough of its own similar equipment. Weapon was also supplied, but on an absolutely microscopic scale - the share of American "trunks" in the Red Army was less than 1 percent.

Could the USSR do without Lend-Lease?

It is known that most of the Lend-Lease deliveries occurred in the period after 1943, when the turning point in the war came. That is, in the most terrible period of the war, the early one, the help of the allies was minimal, and in more successful years it was not so noticeable.

There are those who ask: if the Allies produced a large number of weapons, why did they not send more of them? In fact, the reason was not the stinginess of the "capitalist comrades", but the tonnage of the American and British cargo fleet - it was very insufficient for mass deliveries.

There is another version that the deliveries were simply delayed. And one more thing, the Americans were waiting for someone to help, either the USSR or Germany. depending on the course of the war. The more losses the parties have, the more investments. They have a calculation, as always.

Could the Soviet Union do without Lend-Lease at all? It seems that he could. It was enough to redistribute their own production capacities. However, this would have to mobilize a huge amount of manpower, which means the weakening of the army. Recall that America was an ally of the USSR.

It would be possible to turn a blind eye to the lack of the necessary equipment, but then the army would also be weakened. The war for the USSR would have turned into an even more protracted conflict, the Soviet Army would still have won the war, perhaps later. R. Sherwood (American historian) quoted Harry Hopkins, who did not consider American assistance important in the victory of the USSR over fascism. He said: "The victory was achieved by the heroism and blood of the Russian army."

Benefit for the Americans

Many political scientists, and even politicians themselves, do not hide the benefits of the states from the supply of not quite new and serviceable weapons. But since World War II, they have received their debt from Russia. The exhausted and destroyed USSR could not give it away, and there were all sorts of other reasons, for example, a tense relationship between the two countries. Fully profited.