In 1953, the new China, which had just been born less than four years ago, began a vigorous industrialization movement with the assistance of the big brother of the Soviet Union.
At that time, the industrial base of New China was almost zero, there was no technology, and there was no capital, and without foreign aid, it would be quite difficult to achieve industrialization within five years, not to mention that because of the blockade of the West, many important industrial equipment could not be bought with money.
Fortunately, with the help of the Soviet Union, it not only provided comprehensive assistance to basic industrial equipment, but also provided low-interest loans to alleviate our capital needs.
Big Brother Aid
In the subsequent industrialization construction, regardless of the cost, money, technical personnel, and equipment were given, and in just five years, China successfully established a basic industrial system.
To tell the truth, without the assistance of the Soviet Union, it would not have been possible for New China to complete the construction of the basic industrial system in such a short period of time, so we were extremely close to the Soviet Union at that time and were given the title of "Big Brother".
So, when it comes to the USSR in the fifties, many people give a thumbs up and praise Big Brother for his selflessness, and of course, the USSR at that time also deserves such praise and thanks.
The Soviet Union at that time also deserved such praise and thanks
It's just that the large-scale assistance of the Soviet Union is not selfless, after all, between countries, how can there be eternal friends? Only benefits are eternal, in other words, aid is based on the exchange of interests, which is essentially a win-win situation.
That is, the new China received industrialization assistance from the Soviet Union, and the new China helped the Soviet Union to stabilize the situation internally and in Eastern Europe.
This is the real purpose of the Soviet Union's large-scale aid to China.
So when did Soviet aid to industrialization begin? It began in the period of resisting US aggression and aiding Korea, and if there was no war to resist US aggression and aid Korea, the Soviet Union would not necessarily be willing to help.
At that time, Stalin believed that New China's strength was weak, and once the flames of war were burned to the border, as long as New China did not send troops or did not win the war, then according to the provisions of the "Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship and Alliance," the Soviet Union could garrison troops in a grand manner, continue to occupy the rights and interests of the Sino-Soviet Railway, Dalian Port, and Port Arthur, and make Northeast China the forefront of the Cold War confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union in the Pacific.
Chairman Mao visited the Soviet Union, and the two sides discussed and had many contradictions, and Chairman Mao was full of displeasure
But he did not expect that the volunteers would be able to drive the United Nations troops armed to the teeth back to the 38th parallel, which made Stalin realize that the energy burst out of New China was so powerful, and he also realized the status of New China in the Far East, so he had the initial assistance.
After some deliberations, Stalin initially identified 42 industrial projects for the first batch of aid, including electricity, steel, coal, aluminum, machinery, chemicals, papermaking, etc., mainly in the northeast.
Of course, some important industrial projects, such as the military industry, etc., Stalin did not intend to help.
After all, in a certain way, the relationship between Stalin and New China was not very good, and he once said that Chairman Mao was China's Tito and that China was following the path of Yugoslavia, and everyone must understand the meaning of this.
Moreover, Stalin liked to press other fraternal countries and engage in the Lao Tzu Party, so he would inevitably not provide assistance to core industries.
Therefore, it was after Stalin's death that really made a generous contribution and provided assistance to the nuclear industry.
Frequent political changes after Stalin's death
On March 1, 1953, Stalin, who had never paid much attention to healthy living habits, suddenly suffered a stroke, which could be big or small, and the key was to see the doctor's rescue, but during Stalin's stroke, Beria, Malenkov and Khrushchev tried their best to prevent the doctors from rescuing Stalin and allowed Stalin to fall into a coma.
On March 5, Stalin died.
For Beria and others, Stalin's death was a happy event, after all, working under Stalin was not an easy task, and the slightest carelessness was death.
Second, Stalin did not designate a successor during his lifetime, and these people all had the opportunity to become the new rulers of the Soviet Union, and at present, Beria has the highest probability of ascending to power.
Beria and Stalin
And Beria was the first person to take Stalin's head after his death.
Just a week after Stalin's death, Beria, as Minister of Internal Affairs, set up an investigative team and began to investigate the wrongful convictions of the anti-Stalin period.
This was followed by a proposal to eliminate the consequences of the violation of Soviet law and to prohibit the parade from carrying portraits of leaders during the festival, which was unanimously approved.
It can be said that the liquidation of Stalin was recognized by everyone at that time, and this was also a starting point for the liquidation of Stalin's personality cult.
However, at this time, it was not completely denied, and the current target is mainly Stalin's purges and personality cults.
However, Beria was not Stalin's designated successor, so why should he dictate to others? Coupled with Beria's mastery of the secret police, this is too bad.
Therefore, while Khrushchev and others participated in Beria's liquidation of Stalin, they conspired to bring down Beria.
In June 1953, Khrushchev, Malenkov, and Zhukov joined forces to overthrow Beria and summarily execute him, after which the Soviet Union temporarily held the de facto power of the Soviet Union.
Stalin and Khrushchev
In 1957, with the support of Zhukov, Khrushchev overthrew Malenkov again, and in return, Zhukov served as the Minister of Defense of the Soviet Union, and the original troika became jointly run by Khrushchev and Zhukov.
On October 26, 1957, taking advantage of Zhukov's visit to Yugoslavia, Khrushchev ordered his dismissal, Zhukov began to lose power, and the Soviet Union also began to enter the Khrushchev era from this time.
From March 1953 to October 1957, in just four years, the Soviet Union broke out frequent high-level changes, but no matter how the political situation changed, these people were very tacitly engaged in continuing to carry out the liquidation of Stalin, and in February 1955 alone, the Soviet Union retried tens of thousands of unjust cases, and as for those that did not have time to be dealt with, there were more than 30,000 cases.
With the impact of the liquidation, the Soviet Union began to reduce the praise and praise of Stalin from top to bottom, and from 1955 began to investigate various major historical issues left over from the Stalin period, which can be regarded as turning Stalin's old background over and over, and finally evolved into a secret report released by Khrushchev on February 24, 1956 that shocked the world.
Stalin
Don't look at the Khrushchev secret report as a complete repudiation of Stalin, but in fact it is a suspension of the deep digging into Stalin's old roots, after all, it is difficult to clean up if you dig deeper.
However, what does this have to do with New China's industrialization assistance? The relationship is really big, because frequent political changes and large-scale rehabilitation have plunged the Soviet Union into a period of long-term ideological confusion, and it is urgent to find someone to endorse the Soviet Union, and this person is New China.
The ideological confusion of the Soviet Union and the new China strongly supported
Before Stalin's death, the Soviet Union advertised Stalin as a "loving father", which did not tolerate a little blasphemy.
Before Stalin's death, the Soviet Union promoted Stalin as a "loving father"
But I didn't expect that as soon as I died, all kinds of liquidations would tear a hole in Stalin's glorious image, and the more I tore it, the more it would even involve more people.
For example, Beria has long been promoted as Stalin's close comrade-in-arms, but Beria participated in many unjust cases. So Beria was also taken advantage of the opportunity to bring it down.
After Beria, the rehabilitation continued, and Beria was accompanied by the troika of Khrushchev, Malenkov and Zhukov, and Malenkov and Zhukov were overthrown one after another, and such drastic changes, as well as the various reports on them before the overthrow, caused a considerable impact on the CPSU.
After all, the general line of the CPSU changes course every day, and no one can bear it, this is still the Soviet Union itself, and there are a large number of Eastern European brothers outside, and their relationship with the Soviet Union is not like this.
Eastern European bloc
After Stalin's death, a group of people in power did not have any strong theoretical authority, whether it was Beria or Khrushchev, they seriously lacked theoretical authority, which also led to the Soviet Communist Party's ruling foundation was quite weak.
There is no way, look for allies, choose and choose, and you will find New China.
At this time, New China not only completed the internal revolution on its own, but even won the War to Resist US Aggression and Aid Korea externally, especially to resist US aggression and aid Korea, which brought a shock to the world.
Mr. Peng signed an armistice agreement
Chairman Mao and others also had a very high level of theory, making New China a rising star in the socialist camp, and even more so that the theoretical authority and ideological interpretation power of the socialist camp moved eastward to New China.
For example, when there was a debate on a certain matter at that time, a group of people always sought the views of New China, and even most of the Eastern European socialist countries believed that New China's opinions and explanations were correct and reasonable.
After all, why did a bunch of Eastern Europeans think they should listen to the Soviets? But if the middle is conveyed by the help of New China, then things will be much easier.
Therefore, from this time on, including the Soviet Union, they regarded New China as a person who could be judged, and no matter what they did, they liked to look for New China.
Therefore, in view of the special status of New China, the Soviet Union had no choice but to rely on New China to stabilize its internal affairs, and even begged New China to coordinate relations between Eastern European countries and maintain Soviet rule in Eastern Europe.
Therefore, after Stalin's death, no matter how the political situation changed, there was one thing that must be done, that is, to actively develop relations with New China.
Since the development of relations is inevitable, it is necessary to show sincerity, and at this point, the Soviet Union began large-scale industrialization assistance.
The thorough development of the 156 plan
On May 15, 1953, Beria, who was in power at this time, signed a new aid agreement with the People's Republic of China, known as the "515 Agreement", which provided assistance to a total of 91 projects, including:
2 iron and steel complexes, 8 non-ferrous metallurgical enterprises, 8 mines, 1 coal complex, 3 coal washing plants, 1 petroleum refinery, 32 machine manufacturing plants, 1 automobile manufacturing plant, 1 tractor manufacturing plant, 1 ball bearing factory, 16 power and power machine manufacturing plants, 7 chemical plants, 10 thermal power stations, 2 pharmaceutical industry enterprises producing sulfonamides, penicillin and streptomycin, 1 food industry enterprise
The "515 Agreement" is an important part of the 156 industrial aids in the future, of which there are 3 industrial projects related to tanks and 11 projects related to aircraft and aviation.
Model of Shijiazhuang electric heating plant
After the overthrow of Beria, the Soviet Union continued to carry out industrialization assistance to the new China, adding a large number of projects in late 1953 and 1954, the most noteworthy of which were three large-scale aids in 1954.
After Beria, Khrushchev and others had a troika, but they were only at odds with each other, especially Malenkov, who became Khrushchev's biggest threat, and in order to bring him down, Khrushchev found many allies such as Bulganin and Zhukov, and even got the support of Molotov, Mikoyan and others.
On the other hand, Malenkov was actually relatively close to Beria, and Khrushchev took advantage of this to make trouble and desperately implicate Malenkov in the Beria case.
Malenkov
By the time 1954, Malenkov had completely lost his position, and only Khrushchev was the leader.
Why did Khrushchev rush to bring down Malenkov? On the one hand, of course, he was in power, and on the other hand, he visited China to seek the support of New China.
In August 1954, Khrushchev added 11 additional aid projects;
In September 1954, on the eve of his visit to China, Khrushchev added another 15 projects;
In October 1954, after his visit to China, Khrushchev added 13 additional projects;
These three large-scale aids have taken out the old foundation of the Soviet Union, because in the past, the aid used obsolete technology, but this aid uses the latest and best technology of the Soviet Union, and the quantity is large and the quality is high, which has caused many people to be dissatisfied.
Chairman Mao and Khrushchev
For example, Khrushchev's political ally Voroshilov expressed strong opposition, believing that it was too much to give, and was even unwilling to sign, but Khrushchev continued to exert pressure and persuaded Voroshilov to visit China with a large amount of aid package.
Moreover, in addition to industrialization assistance, Khrushchev also provided a huge interest-free loan for five years, abolished the "Secret Supplementary Agreement" in the "Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance," adjusted the ratio of the rupee to the renminbi, handed over the shares of the joint venture jointly established by the two sides to the Chinese side, and gave all the equipment of the Lushun naval base to the Chinese side.
New China also reciprocated the favor by firmly supporting Khrushchev's status, and at the same time did not make any regulations or arrangements for the arrangement of visiting China, and went to any region at will, which also brought the relations between the two sides to a climax.
In order to thank New China for its support, in January 1955, Khrushchev announced that he would give a luxurious gift to China's nuclear industry, which was the source of the future 156 Program.
Nuclear industry assistance
The following month, Khrushchev relieved Malenkov of all his duties.
Someone asked, can the significance of New China's support be so great? There really is, because Khrushchev was born as a political cadre and represented the party affairs of the CPSU, while Malenkov was a technocrat and compared with a technocrats, party affairs require ideological and moral correctness, and with this, it is possible to integrate the forces within the faction and suppress the other side.
And it just so happened that New China provided these two important contents, which made Khrushchev invincible in the subsequent struggle.
Of course, in addition to consolidating Khrushchev's position, it also consolidated Soviet domination over Eastern Europe.
Relying on the new China, the Soviet Union consolidated its rule over Eastern Europe
The Poznan Incident in Poland in June 1956 and the subsequent uprising in Hungary in October were collectively known as the Polish-Hungarian October Incident.
Poznan protested
To be honest, Poland and Hungary, the two Eastern European countries, did not treat the Soviet Union very much, and were originally feuds, but during World War II, the interests of the United States and the Soviet Union were divided into the Soviet Union, so an anti-Soviet wave broke out during the Stalin period, and it was only because of the pressure of the Soviet army that they were forced to submit to the Soviet Union.
Then Poland and Hungary copied the Stalin model, and the economy did not get up, but exacerbated the contradictions with the Soviet Union, and the leaders of the Poland and Hungary regimes were controlled by the Soviet Union, in fact, the puppet regimes of the Soviet Union, and finally turmoil broke out.
At its worst, Poland and Hungary were ready for war with the Soviet Union, especially Poland, which had already distributed weapons to the population and vowed to fight the Soviet Union to the end.
Tanks march into Budapest
Once the situation deteriorates, the drastic changes in Eastern Europe at the end of the eighties will break out in advance to the fifties, even if the Soviet Union now relies on military victory, but it will not be able to effectively rule the region, without Eastern Europe, what will the Soviet Union take with the United States Cold War?
Seeing that things were getting worse, Khrushchev sought the help of Wang Bingnan, ambassador to Poland, and thus there were all kinds of firefighting in New China.
Relying on its unique ideological position and its good image over the years, New China maneuvered in various ways in Eastern Europe, on the one hand to avoid the escalation of the situation, and on the other hand, to persuade the Soviet Union to relax its economic control over the two countries, and did considerable coordination and communication work, and finally quelled the turmoil.
Streets of Hungary
And the mediation method of the new China was actually quite ingenious, leading all the contradictions to Stalin, which not only quelled the turmoil, but also helped Khrushchev to sit firmly in his position.
Attributing the contradictions between Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union to the problem of the hegemonic style of the Stalin period, and transferring the hatred of Eastern Europe towards the Soviet Union to the Soviet Union personally, after all, not long after Stalin's death, considering Stalin's historical status, this transfer was quite effective, greatly alleviating the dissatisfaction of Eastern Europe with the Soviet Union and maintaining the rule of the Soviet Union.
Statue of Stalin that was pushed to
Moreover, at that time, the Soviet Union was still carrying out a campaign to remove Stalin, and not to mention that taking Stalin's back was a cause for the Soviet Union's face-damage, but in fact, it affirmed the movement to remove Stalin from the Soviet Union, and objectively provided a platform for Khrushchev's secret report, which could be regarded as providing a strong endorsement for the legitimacy of the Soviet internal regime.
In other words, it was to help Khrushchev secure his position, and therefore this plan was deeply approved by Khrushchev.
After Khrushchev's secret report, Mikoyan visited China and added 55 new agreements on key Soviet aid projects to China as a reward for New China.
Later, the aid also turned the initial aid into 368 projects, but these projects were too many, and due to the conditions at the time, New China was difficult to digest for a while, and took the initiative to demand a reduction in aid.
This is the ins and outs of the Soviet Union's large-scale industrialization aid, which can be said to be essentially a win-win situation, after all, there are never permanent friends between countries, only eternal interests.
Sino-Soviet honeymoon phase
Although the aid began during the Stalin period, it was basically not a high-quality industry, and it was Beria and Khrushchev who really made a big deal, and with their large handwriting, China successfully completed basic industrialization within five years.