198. “Otkrytoe pis’mo Prezidiumu Ts.I.K’a Soiuza SSR,” Biulleten’ oppozitsii, no. 27 (March 1932): 1–6 (at 5).
199. Davies and Wheatcroft, Years of Hunger, 311 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 877, l. 9); Sovetskaia iustitsiia, no. 12 (1932): 29; Zelenin, “Byl li ‘kolkhoznyi neonep’?” 108–9 (citing GARF, f. 7486, op. 3, d. 237, l. 225–6); Davies et al., Years of Progress, 14. Stalin had crossed out a section in the draft of the decree that would have guaranteed feed to collective farmers for their personal animals. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 3016, l. 1. Another decree, a fortnight later, publicized the decision. Davies stresses that although Stalin did not initiate the relaxation on livestock, he would grab credit. Davies, “Stalin as Economic Policy-Maker,” 136–7. One scholar argues that Yakovlev and “bourgeois” specialists working under him had initiated a shift from extensive to intensive growth already in late 1931–early 1932. Tauger, “People’s Commissariat of Agriculture,” 157–9.
200. Sochineniia, XIII: 134. Stalin permitted a foreigner, James Abbé, to photograph him in the Little Corner on April 13, 1932, resulting in a sensational portrait on the New York Times front page. Abbé, I Photograph Russia; von Dewitz and Johnson, Shooting Stalin. Stalin attended the politburo meetings throughout April and May 1932: RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 874–885. The same day Abbé got twenty minutes in the Kremlin, an infirm Mężyński wrote to Stalin pleading to be relieved of his position. Stalin refused. Molotov concurred. Kuibyshev wrote on the resignation request, “read it and understand nothing.” Mężyński had suffered a heart attack on Dec. 13, 1931, returning to work on Jan. 25, 1932.
201. Rudich, Holod 1932–33 rokiv, 148–50. Stalin received an OGPU report enumerating the mass flight out of villages region by region, and naming “food difficulties” as a prime motivator. Zelenin, Stalinskaia ‘revoliutsiia sverkhu,’ 25–6 (no citation).
202. Khlevniuk, Master of the House, 43 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 42, d. 26, l. 1–6).
203. The areas affected were better supplied than villages, but a low priority among industrial regions. Rossman, Worker Resistance under Stalin. On strikes, see also Gromtseva, Teni izchezaiut v smol’nom, 28–9.
204. Werth and Moullec, Rapports secrets soviétiques, 209–16 (at 214).
205. Davies, Crisis and Progress, 188–91 (citing APRF, f. 3, op. 22, d. 39, l. 6–7).
206. Rossman, Worker Resistance under Stalin, 231 (citing RGASPI, f. 81, op. 3, d. 213, l. 90); Danilov et al., Tragediia Sovetskoi derevni, III: 318–54 (TsA FSB, f. 2, op. 10, d. 53, l. 1–64: April 1932).
207. Kotkin, Magnetic Mountain. In Ivanovo in 1937, there would be a mere three work stoppages involving a very small number of people protesting rising norms and food shortages. Rittersporn, Anguish, 233 (citing RGASPI, f. 81, op. 3, d. 230, l. 87).
208. Later, while reading back issues of Pravda, Stalin would erupt at the loyalist Yaroslavsky over an article (May 31, 1932) admitting the fact of strikes in Ivanovo—even though the article blamed the already sacked local party leadership—because he felt that any admission handed ammunition to enemies to speak of “a ‘new Kronstadt.’” Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 120–2 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 77, l. 11, 12–12ob.: June 5, 1932), 139n1 (f. 17, op. 3, d. 887, l. 9); Khromov, Po stranitsam, 34–5. The politburo condemned Yaroslavsky’s article and removed him from the editorial position at Pravda.
209. Berson, Sowieckie zbrojenia moralne, 7. Berson, under the pseudonym Otmar, served as Moscow correspondent for the Polish Telegraph Agency and Gazeta Polska, until his expulsion in 1935.
210. Rassweiler, Generation of Power; Goriaeva, “Velikaia kniga dnia,” 256–7.
211. On May 3, Stalin received the International Herald Tribune correspondent to reiterate Soviet interest in expanded trade with the United States and told him that in the forthcoming second Five-Year Plan, “yes, light industry will develop to a much greater extent than before.” Sochineniia, XIII: 258 (Ralph Barnes). More broadly, see Mahoney, Dispatches and Dictators. Stalin played little role in drawing up the second Five-Year Plan, which was overseen by Molotov, Kuibyshev, and Orjonikidze, yet it could not go forward until he approved.
