Where did the Soviet Union get its industrial technology from?

Question

We are talking about going from the serfdom and agriculture to making rockets and televisions and cars and chemicals.
Where did they get their techno from? how?

Answer 1

Well, despite their huge losses during WWII, the Soviet Union was able to rebuild using stuff they stole from Eastern Europe mostly. When the USSR erected the "Iron Curtain" they managed to secure a lot of people and capital that they would later use to develop technologies. Also, spying came into play quite a bit (remember that Communism was an international movement that, at least for a while, answered directly to the Comintern - the USSR). Cold War tensions drove the Soviets to steal, spy, and develop more and more. East Germany was especially significant in allowing the Soviet Union to develop technologically after WWII. If India was the Jewel of the British Empire, East Germany was the Soviet Equivalent, but without having to worry about cats like Gandhi! If you're interested in Soviet spying check out Alger Hiss or the Rosenbergs/Greenglass incidents for some American examples. Good luck!

Answer 2

The mass industralisation of the Soviet Union was the work of Stalin. After the Civil War and the death of Lenin he decided that the Soviet Union was 100 years behind the west and he introduced mesures to industralise the Soviet economy. He was ruthless and the people suffered terribly. In the cities the workers were forced to work crippling hours and being absent from work and tardiness were considered crimes against the state and was prosecuted mercilessly. In the countryside by centralizing the agriculture into collective farms and persecuting the Kulaks (prosperous peasnts) he tried to turn the agricultral economy into a industrial economy. Stalin also seized the harvests to feed the workers in the cities and prohibited the sales of surplus which led to the massive famines in the Ukraine and Russia in the 1930's. Of course with the agricultural harvests not meeting the impossible targets set by Stalin, as well as massive hoarding by the peasants this meant that both the City workers and the peasants starved. Despite this the rapid industrial growth was impressive and by the time Hitler invaded Russia he had forced through massive industralisation but at a terrible human cost which probably mesured in the millions of deaths. A lot of the technology was down to the brilliance of the Russian minds and the stubborness of Stalin to succed. Also the jet engine, concorde and the atomic bomb to name but a few technologies were stolen by the Soviets through their impressive spy network

Answer 3

Internally. The race for technological superiority has had the US and Russia running for 50 - 100 years. They develop most of their technology internally, they spend (or used to) 10% of their gross domestic product on military spending and their efforts in research and development, the US spends on 2%.

Answer 4

what makes your country so special ( whichever one it is )

They have scientists, engineers and brains in Russia as well you know

Its a strange, and bordering on arrogant, view to think that the Soviet Union needed to "get" its technology from somewhere

Answer 5

They had at one stage American and German trades-craftsman and engineers in their country to help them set up factories and processes, and the rest came from industrial spionage and just basically nicking them