[QUOTE=ralph124c]
Everything I’ve read about the USSR says that their economy was VERY inefficient-as was mentioned, it took years to put up a building. I talked to russian aerospace engineers who told me how hard it was to get basic stuff (prototype tools, screws, nuts and bolts, etc.) The industrial sector was hamstrung by poor quality and low productivity.
Yet the whole mess was portrayed as such a serious threat to the West! One ex-Russian army officer told me that much of the (impressive) military stuff (missiles, tanks, guns, etc.) carted around on May Day was non-functional!
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It’s a mistake to believe that just because the economy was inefficient (which it clearly was) that the country was not a threat. Back in the late 'Fifties, the average American considered the Russians to be little more than a bunch of dumb peasants, which is why it was such a surprise when they launched Sputnik 1 into orbit. (This was not such a surprise to the American aerospace establishment, which was well aware that Soviet Rocketry was years ahead of the Americans, despite the U.S. Army having grabbed the best scientists and engineers in the Heeresversuchsstelle Peenemünde and the bulk of working A.4 and other Aggregat models, since the U.S. military funded ballistic missile research only at very low levels from 1945 through 1953.) The Soviets, even when the fictitious missile upon which gap that Kennedy campaigned to victory in 1960 became reality in the early 'Seventies, always had supply and quality control problems, but their designs were half again as clever for it; instead of relying on high quality, advanced technology, and cutting edge materials science, designed workable solutions with less capable materials that compensated for low build quality by building in extra allowances, and incidentally making the designs more robust and usable with minimal training.
It is true that some of the vast number of missile designs paraded around were “dimensional models” that never had a functioning design; it’s also true that, for disinformation purposes, the Soviets would occasionally float false or discarded design documents to the West. However, it’s also true that the Soviets tested and deployed the first Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile (SLBM), the first true MIRV-capable missile, the Fractional Orbital Bombardment System (FOBS), and arguably the first ABM system (the A-35, encircling and protecting Moscow). The Soviets were behind the curve with solid propellant boosters (in part because of a lack of experience and problematic issues with solids, and in part as a general design philosophy), with digital computer guidance systems, and surveillance satellites, but did and have continued to maintain the lead in long range cruise missiles, manned space platforms, and anti-aircraft missile systems. The Soviet Space Shuttle program essentially copied the goals and forms of the American STS, but there were a number of differences in which it was widely regarded as being functionally superior. (Unfortunately, a lack of funding and the percieved–and ultimately real–risks of the winged shuttle handicapped the program into achieving only a single, unmanned orbital flight.) Despite what Tom Clancy might write about Soviet weaponry, it was in fact formidable and very threatening to the West. Despite quality problems and difficulties in getting advanced technology into production, Soviet weapon capability was generally comperable, and in some cases ahead of that of Western powers. (Comparisons of U.S. capabiliity against obsolescent equipment and ill-trained troops in Iraq is an unfair assessment.)
The economy was very inefficient, of course, and especially in the post-Khrushchev years, sustained largely by imports of consumer products and agricultural foodstuffs that the Soviets couldn’t produce domestically in adequate quantities. The largest part of their domestic industry was dedicated to military production (which despite the claim of Reagan supporters that the Soviets became bankrupt responding to American military spending, had operated more-or-less continuously at a high level since Stalin’s era) and because of central planning and bureaucratic inertia it was difficult to produce other goods. As a result, the main cashflow into the Soviet Union, aside from petroleum and raw commodities, were from weapon sales, which is why the AK-47 and the Scud missile can be found in the inventory of every tin-pot dictator. Ultimately, the Soviet economy had been bankrupt long before it collapsed during Gorbechev’s attempts at market and political reform; this was not unexpected by Western scholars, but the degree to which it was unsustaintable was surprising to virtually all. In retrospect, the Soviet economy had been running on fumes since at least the beginning of Brezhnev’s reign if not before. So, while it’s true that the Soviets had difficulty building hardware to the kind of quality standards acceptable in the Western world, they were by no means a Potemkin village of military might. One might, in fact, make counter-claims against the U.S. military, which in a number of cases fielded equipment before it was operationally fit or based upon false or misleading evaluations of reliability and capability. (Can anyone say “Patriot Advanced Capability” missile interceptor?)
Ultimately, the Soviets fell down because their system sucked–economically, logistically, politically, and ideologically. They told the same lies everyone else tells about how great the economy is doing, only the Soviets raised the standard politician’s prattle to the level of uncontestable dogma, and failed to address the failures even when it was clear that the system was buckling in from all sides.
Stranger
shortages and all