History: Stalin?

Question

Why was labor camps important for the development of the Soviet Union in the years 1928-41?

Answer 1

Communist countries don't have the capital necessary to employ and pay people the way capitalist countries do. It is much cheaper to put people in concentration camps and have them work at no cost and spend the savings on other things like weapons, armaments, espionage operations, foreign revolutions and atomic or nuclear research. This policy was very typical of the former Soviet Union under Stalin and all of his successors. It is still true with China and especially North Korea today.

Answer 2

After the Bolshevik revolution of 1917 Lenin announced that any "class enemy", even in the absence of evidence of any crime against the state, could not be trusted and should not be treated better than a criminal. The Gulag began as a reformed extension of earlier labor camps (katorgas), operated in Siberia as a part of penal system in Imperial Russia, and quickly overflowed with the enemies of the people, a designation used by the Bolshevik government for officials accused of corruption, sabotage and embezzlement, various political enemies and dissidents, as well as former aristocrats, businessmen and large land owners.


Soviet poster of the 1920s: The GPU strikes on the head the counter-revolutionary saboteurAs an all-Union institution, the Gulag was officially established on April 25, 1930 as the "Ulag" by the OGPU order 130/63 in accordance with the Sovnarkom order 22 p. 248 dated April 7, 1930, and was renamed into Gulag in November. The Gulag boomed during Joseph Stalin's regime. Failed projects, bad harvests, accidents, poor production, and poor planning were routinely attributed to corruption and sabotage, and accused thieves and saboteurs on whom to put the blame were found en masse. At the same time the rapidly increasing need for natural resources and a booming industrialization program fueled a demand for cheap labor. Denunciations, quotas for arrest, summary executions, and secret police activity became widespread. The widest opportunities for an easy, in most cases automatic, conviction of any person of a crime were provided by the Article 58 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR, which gave the state virtually unlimited power over its citizens.

Answer 3

http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0013-0117(198605)2%3A39%3A2%3C264%3ASIRSPC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-6

http://www.answers.com/topic/joseph-stalin

check out the link...good luck.

Born: 1879
Birthplace: Gori, Georgia, Russia (now Republic of Georgia)
Died: 5 March 1953
Best Known As: Leader of the U.S.S.R. from 1928 to 1953

Name at birth: Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili

Ruthless and ambitious, Joseph Stalin grabbed control of the Soviet Union after the death of V.I. Lenin in 1924. As a member of the Bolshevik party, Stalin (his adopted name meaning "Man of Steel") had an active role in Russia's October Revolution in 1917. He maneuvered his way up the communist party hierarchy, and in 1922 was named General Secretary of the Central Committee. By the end of the 1920s Stalin had expelled his rival Leon Trotsky, consolidated power, and was the de facto dictator of the Soviet Union. In the 1930s Stalin summarily executed his political enemies and started aggressive industrial and agricultural programs that left untold thousands of peasants dead. During World War II Stalin was the commander of the Soviet military, and attended the postwar conferences at Yalta, Teheran and Potsdam. After Stalin's death he was denounced by his successor, Nikita Khrushchev, and "Stalinism" was officially condemned.

Answer 4

This was the period of the 5-Year Plans- targeted and centrally planned economic policies that required the state to move labour to where it was needed.
There was also an element of punishment, but this was far more characteristic of the mid-late 1930s.
Stalin was trying to do in Russia what other countries had taken decades to do- and that meant loss of freedom, brutality and hard work for little pay. Remote areas had to be opened up, and huge projects were conceived and executed.
Nevetheless, Stalin mechanised the Russian economy, turning it into a modern economy.

Answer 5

Get rid of all people that can get in the way. Purge.
Use slave labor to gift all your friends with stuff. Bribe.
It give you a land full of yes men living of the blood of others.
With people afraid to have a thought of their own.
Robot people doing what ever Stalin wanted.

Answer 6

Because much of the development was being done miles from anywhere.
Nobody in their right mind would have worked on those jobs, which was why they were forced to work to death basically

Answer 7

They needed forced unpaid labor to make their socialism work. They needed a place to put those who questioned or rebelled against their totalitarian government.

Answer 8

They weren't. They were an indication of economic failure in which much of the talent was squandered. They were only used to remove any political or intellectual opposition.
More could have been achieved by other methods.