Among the many accusations that are directed against Stalin, one can find the opinion that in the 1930s a course of excessive militarization was deliberately taken. From this statement, it is then concluded that the Soviet leadership was preparing for external expansion, wars of conquest. In the West, this myth is part of the more popular "Soviet threat" myth.
What course in the development of the national economy was a priority for the Soviet leadership? To answer this question, you first need to realize one simple truth - in the USSR, no one hid the fact that the policy of industrialization solves many problems in the country, including the problem of increasing defense capability. This was stated directly and clearly. Suffice it to recall Stalin's famous speech about the lag of the Soviet Union by 50-100 years from the advanced countries of the West and the need to bridge this gap, otherwise the Union is doomed to complete defeat and destruction. The USSR in the 1920s, despite its vast territory and significant population, was a second - third tier country, which many in the West had already written off. Too heavy wounds were inflicted on Russia during the First World War, the Civil War, intervention, white, red, "green" and foreign terror, mass emigration.
It should be remembered that the main militarist in the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 1930s was Mikhail Nikolaevich Tukhachevsky (the future “innocent victim of repression”). It was Tukhachevsky in the most difficult, economically, period of development of Soviet Russia, when funds were not enough for the most necessary, put forward a plan for large-scale militarization of the country. It should be noted that Mikhail Tukhachevsky held significant posts in the military leadership of the USSR and had a great influence on the development of the armed forces. In November 1925, after the death of Mikhail Frunze, he became Chief of Staff of the Red Army, and then Deputy People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs. Due to a conflict with the People's Commissar for Military and Naval Affairs of the USSR Kliment Voroshilov, he was removed from office, in 1928 - 1931. headed the Leningrad Military District. In 1931 he was appointed head of the Red Army's armaments, then deputy chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR, deputy people's commissar for military and naval affairs (since April 1936, Tukhachevsky is the first deputy people's commissar of defense).
Tukhachevsky demanded from the leadership of the USSR a sharp increase in the number of the country's armed forces, the production of weapons and ammunition. On December 26, 1926, Tukhachevsky concluded that there was no army and rear in the country in his report "Defense of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics." In his opinion, the USSR and the Red Army were not ready for war. On January 10, 1930, he handed over a voluminous note to the People's Commissar Voroshilov, in which he tried to substantiate his ideas. He offered to have 11 million in peacetime. military establishment. They were supposed to include: 260 infantry and cavalry divisions, 50 divisions of the High Command Reserve, 225 machine-gun battalions in the High Command Reserve, 40 thousand aircraft in formation (with the industry's ability to produce 122, 5 thousand combat aircraft per year) and 50 thousand tanks in service (with a possible production of 100 thousand annually). For example, for the entire Great Patriotic War, only 122, 1 thousand aircraft were produced in the USSR. Tukhachevsky also offered to be able to produce almost the same number of aircraft annually. In addition, M. Tukhachevsky proposed to create dual-purpose equipment - ground-based anti-aircraft artillery, armored tractors, and to carry out the massive introduction of dynamo-reactive artillery, etc. Moreover, Tukhachevsky made these proposals only at the very beginning of industrialization, when the USSR did not have the opportunity even to partial implementation of such plans. The adventurism (or provocation) of Tukhachevsky could bring great misfortune to the country.
It was not for nothing that Stalin, having familiarized himself with Tukhachevsky's plans, on March 23, 1930, in a note addressed to Voroshilov, noted the "fantastic" ideas of the commander, and the fact that the "plan" does not contain the main one, that is, "taking into account the real possibilities of the economic, financial and cultural order." … Attention was drawn to the fact that Tukhachevsky fundamentally violated every conceivable and permissible proportion between the armed forces, as part of the state, and the state, as a whole. Tukhachevsky's "plan" draws attention only to the military side of the problem, forgetting that the army is a derivative of the economic and cultural state of the country. It was concluded that the implementation of this "plan" led to the death of the country and the army. In addition, the implementation of this "plan" could lead to a situation of counterrevolution and the complete destruction of socialist construction, when the power in the country could be seized by the dictatorship of "red militarism" hostile to the people.
The accusation of "fantasy" and "red militarism" from Stalin's lips is quite understandable. Suffice it to recall what happened in the country in 1930, when Tukhachevsky proposed to send 11 million men to the army (cutting them off from the national economy) and build 122 thousand aircraft and 100 thousand tanks a year. In the Soviet Union, the first five-year plan (1928-1932) was carried out, a difficult process of collectivization was going on, the foundations of the country's national economy were laid. It was a turning point when the future of the country and its people was being decided. Tukhachevsky's proposals, if they tried to implement them, could ruin all plans in the bud, exhaust forces and lead to a severe socio-economic crisis (respectively, and a political one).
It should also be noted that when developing a plan for the second five-year plan (it was approved by the 17th Congress of the CPSU (b), in 1934 - the resolution "On the second five-year plan for the development of the national economy of the USSR" was adopted), the idea of the advanced development of industries that produced Common consumption goods. This plan was prepared, but it was not possible to implement it in its original version. The beginning of the second five-year plan coincided with the coming to power in Germany of the National Socialist Party headed by Adolf Hitler. Due to the fact that the geopolitical situation in Europe has sharply changed for the worse and the threat of war has become more obvious, the Soviet leadership decided to re-establish maximum targets for the growth of heavy industry, instead of the planned outstripping growth of light industry. It is clear that light industry was not abandoned, it was developed, but the Soviet leadership had to tilt in favor of heavy industry. As a result, already in 1938, the production of military enterprises increased by a third. And in 1939, when the third five-year plan for the national economy of the Soviet Union was being implemented, the output of the Military-Industrial Complex had already grown by half.
However, there was simply no other way then. There were very smart people in the Soviet leadership, and they perfectly understood that the world was heading for a new big war. Truth, if you want peace - get ready for war, no one has canceled it yet. The course towards the development of heavy industry (including the military-industrial complex) was not made from a good life.
