The role of science in the development of mineral resources of the European North of the USSR in the context of industrialization

Filippova Tatiana Petrovna PhD in History Scientific Associate, Komi Scientific Centre of Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences 167000, Russia, Komi Republic, Syktyvkar, 24 Kommunisticheskaya str., office 311 tanya.tatiana-fil@yandex.ru Other publications by this author

The issues of studying and developing the Russian North have been the subject of research interest of the scientific community for the past few decades. The strengthening of the geopolitical role of this region and the growth of its strategic importance in providing the country with valuable natural resources have determined the vector of state policy aimed at finding future ways to develop the regions of the Far North and the Arctic. This has actualized among scientists the issues of choosing approaches and methods to study the richest natural resources of this territory ^{[1, 2]}. The analysis of the mobilization model of the development of the North, implemented in the first decades of the history of the USSR, is of great interest to modern researchers. At the turn of the 1920s and 1930s. The Union has entered a period of new socio-economic modernization. The first five-year plan for the development of the national economy (1928-1932) marked a new course of industrial development for the country, in which the most important importance was attached to the accelerated geological study of the entire territory of the country. One of the main tasks assigned by the authorities to scientists was the search for mineral resources for the development of industry in the USSR. In implementing the tasks of the first five-year plan to build a solid foundation for the socialist economy and strengthen the country's defense capability, one of the main roles was to be played by the North of the country with huge reserves of forests, fuel and mineral resources. The Soviet government embarked on a policy of intensifying the industrial development of the Far North and the Arctic.

The process of Soviet industrialization, the methods of its implementation, the stages and the main results have always been the focus of close attention of both domestic and foreign researchers. Russian historiography has accumulated extensive material related to the study of this period of Soviet history: archival documents on the history of the industrial project have been published, and its experience has been assessed both for the development of the USSR and for modern Russia ^{[3, 4, 5]}. The study of the phenomenon of the Soviet economy is also in the field of view of scientists from other countries who Recognizing the significant achievements of such a state policy for the development of the country, they focus primarily on the repressive policies and miscalculations of the government of the Soviet Union ^{[6, 7, 8]}. This attention of the scientific community to Soviet industrialization is primarily due to significant transformational changes, when the USSR entered a new stage of economic development, and vast remote areas were involved in the socio-economic system of the state in a short time. One of the options for the long-term development of the northern and Arctic territories, which is considered in modern society, may be a return to mobilization models of development with the determining role of the state ^{[9, 10]}. In this regard, it is of urgent importance to study the rich historical experience of implementing industrialization plans in certain northern regions of the country. One of the main outposts in the implementation of the economic objectives of the industrial project was the remote, underdeveloped territory of the European North of the country, which has rich natural resources.

A significant number of published works are devoted to the history of industrial development of certain regions of the European North of Russia. Scientists are studying the main features of the implementation of industrialization, its most important results, which had a significant impact on the economic development of the European North ^{[11, 12]}. However, at present, questions about the role of science in expanding the mineral resource base of this territory, which became the basis for the formation and development of the mining industry, have not been the subject of a separate comprehensive study. This article is aimed at filling this gap. It analyzes the main tasks and results of scientific research in the field of prospecting and studying the mineral resources of the European North during the implementation of the industrial project in the USSR.

The research was based on a set of documents on the history of the development of the territory of the European North of the USSR, deposited in the funds of the Russian state archives: the Polar Commission of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (F. 75) of the St. Petersburg branch of the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences; the Council for the Study of Productive Forces of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (F. 174) of the Archive of the Russian Academy of Sciences; Lenin Institute of the State Administration of the Hydrometeorological Service under the Council of Ministers of the USSR" (F. 369) of the Central State Archive of Scientific and Technical Documentation of St. Petersburg; "Documents on the development of the Kola Peninsula and the construction of the city of Kirovsk (formerly Khibinogorsk). Collection" (F. 194), "Orders of Lenin and the Order of the October Revolution "Apatit" production Association named after S.M. Kirov of the Russian Agrochemical Company Rosagrochemistry" (F. 179) of the State Archive of the Murmansk region in Kirovsk; "Komineft" Production Association of the Order of the Red Banner of Labor" (F. 1668) of the State Institution of the Republic of Komi "National Archive of the Komi Republic".

A significant part of the research's source base was made up of published documents, primarily resolutions, orders of state authorities, resolutions and resolutions of party congresses of the 1920s and 1930s on the development of the country's economy. Among them, the State Plan for the Electrification of Russia (GOELRO) of 1920, the materials of the First (1928-1932) and Second (1933-1937) five–year plans for the national economic construction of the USSR were of paramount importance, the study of which made it possible to determine the main tasks that the state set for the scientific community in the study of the European North of the country. An equally important component of the research was the work with published reports and articles by scientists who recorded information about their scientific research and results.

The intensification of the development of the northern and Arctic territories of the USSR, outlined in the first national economic five-year plan, was a development of the ideas of the State Plan for the Electrification of Russia (GOELRO) in 1920 ^[13]. It provided for the inclusion of the raw materials of the European North in the economic development of the country. During the 1920s, expeditions of the Geological Committee of the Supreme Economic Council, the Russian Academy of Sciences (since 1925 – the USSR Academy of Sciences), the Northern Scientific and Commercial Expedition of the Supreme Economic Council (since 1925 - the Scientific Research Institute for the Study of the North) identified apatite–nepheline and iron ores of All-Union importance on the Kola Peninsula, pegmatites The boundaries of the Pechora coal basin have been established on the territory of Karelia, the deposits of oil and rare radioactive elements in the Ukhta region. The obtained results provided the initial stage of the industrial development of the European North of the USSR, becoming the basis for the formation of the mining industry.

During the first five-year plan, further progressive "conquest" of the European North of the USSR was planned. Industrial construction facilities were supposed to be built in the areas of explored mineral resources, including factories and plants for the exploitation and processing of raw materials (the Khibiny apatite mines, the Pegmatite Plant, the Mica Factory near Petrozavodsk, the Celestine Plant on the Ust-Pinega River, etc.). Further intensive geological exploration and development of well-known deposits, primarily apatite-nepheline ores, coal, oil and pegmatites, were prioritized for industrialization. During the years of the first five-year plan, the largest number of enterprises located in the polar and circumpolar territories was supposed to be put into operation in the European North of the USSR ^{[14, 15]}. The tasks of expanding the mineral resource base of the European North of the USSR were also outlined by the second five-year plan for the development of the national economy (1933-1937), which set the course for building a powerful material and technical base in the USSR. One of its most important foundations was to be the subsoil of the North, which was planned to be systematically integrated into the industrial development of the country, which determined the expansion of tasks for their search and exploitation ^[16].

In general, in accordance with the first national economic plans in the European North of the USSR, it was necessary to practically solve the key problems of introducing the mineral resources of this territory into the most important parts of the USSR economy. Exploration and exploitation of coal and oil fields in the Pechora River basin would provide fuel for the industry of the European North of the country and the city of Leningrad, and in the future, the needs of the Northern Sea Fleet. The development of the reserves of apatite-nepheline ores of the Kola Peninsula guaranteed for the country for many years a reliable source for the production of fertilizers, and its richest iron ore deposits determined the prospects for the creation of the north-western metallurgical base of the USSR. The pegmatite deposits of North Karelia could supply the whole country with valuable feldspar raw materials.

The leading scientific forces of the country played a leading role in the implementation of the tasks of accelerating the involvement of mineral resources of the European North of the USSR in the economy. In accordance with the Resolution of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR "On the organization of scientific research for the needs of industry" (1928), institutions needed to establish a close relationship between scientific activity and long-term plans for the development of industry and the economy ^{[17, pp. 750-755]}. This orientation has led to significant reorganizations in the work of scientific departments.

In the late 1920s, a significant amount of scientific research in the European North of the USSR was carried out by the staff of the Geological Committee of the Supreme Economic Council. However, the large-scale tasks of the scientific and technological development of the USSR led to the search for new more effective forms of functioning of the geological survey of the country. In 1929, the Geological Committee was transformed into the Main Geological Exploration Directorate (GGRU), and specialized geological exploration institutes were organized on the basis of its departments and sections. Geological exploration and prospecting in the European North of the USSR was under the jurisdiction of the Leningrad Regional Geological Exploration Department, formed in 1929 on the basis of the Leningrad branch of the committee (since 1931 – the Leningrad Geological Exploration Trust, since 1933 – the Leningrad Geological, Hydro-Geodetic Trust). The USSR Academy of Sciences was responsible for solving complex scientific problems of a geological nature in the study of the European North. The institution, continuing intensive expeditionary research, began conducting stationary scientific research in the 1930s. In 1930, the Khibinsk Mining Station of the USSR Academy of Sciences was established in Khibinogorsk (Kola Peninsula) (since 1934– the Kola Base of the USSR Academy of Sciences). In 1933, the Bureau of the Polar Commission for the Study of the Northern Territory of the USSR Academy of Sciences was established in Arkhangelsk (since 1936, the Northern Base of the USSR Academy of Sciences). The Scientific Research Institute for the Study of the North remained one of the leading scientific institutions of the USSR, which was responsible for the study of the productive forces of the northern territories. In 1930, it was reorganized into the All-Union Arctic Institute, whose tasks were focused on the research of the Arctic zone of the USSR.

The tasks of industrialization were implemented in the "new" industrial areas of the country, remote from the center of the country, where there were no transport routes and the necessary human resources for construction. The implementation of the socialist construction plan in these territories was largely entrusted to the prisoner contingent. The resolution of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU(b) "On the use of labor of criminal prisoners" in 1929 provided for the use of labor of criminal prisoners in the development of industrial resource areas ^{[18, pp. 54-56]}. The implementation of this task was entrusted to the United State Political Administration (OGPU), in whose structure the Main Directorate of Correctional Labor Camps (GULAG) was established in 1930. The European North of the USSR became not only the territory where the system of camps and special settlements originated, but was also characterized by a high concentration of their number ^[19].

The first experience of industrial development of the European North of the USSR by convicts was applied at the turn of the 1920s and 1930s in the work of the Ukhta and Vaigach expeditions of the OGPU. In the 1930s, a large number of correctional labor camps were deployed to develop the fuel and energy base associated with the organization of scientific research and industrial exploitation of the subsoil of the Pechora coal basin and the Ukhta oil-bearing region. The labor of special settlers and prisoners was also used in the construction of a mining complex on the Kola Peninsula. Through the efforts of prisoners in the European North, significant industrial facilities, hydraulic structures, roads and railways were built, and the region's infrastructure was created.

The expansion of the GULAG system went hand in hand with a tightening of policy towards the scientific community and the use of large-scale repression. As a result, many geologists convicted under Article 58 joined the contingent of camps in the European North of the USSR. Famous scientists among them are N. N. Tikhonovich, K. G. Voinovsky-Krieger, K. P. Kalitsky, P. I. Polevoy, P. V. Wittenburg, I. I. Ginzburg and many others.

Since the late 1920s, the geography of geological surveys in the European North of the USSR has expanded significantly. Studies of most of the territory of the Pechora River basin were under the jurisdiction of the GULAG structures. The repressive regime effectively used science to achieve important economic goals, as demonstrated by the experience of accelerated research carried out in the area. Since 1929 The Ukhta expedition of the OGPU (since 1931– the Ukhta-Pechora correctional labor camp) began to develop the Ukhta oil-bearing region and the Pechora coal basin in order to create wide industrial zones, expand the search and exploration of minerals (oil, coal, radium, etc.). As a result of the geological surveys of the expedition, carried out under the leadership of geologist N. N. Tikhonovich, the Chibyu oil field was discovered in 1930, which marked the beginning of commercial exploitation of northern oil ^{[20, l. 1-3.]}.

Another significant event for the development of this territory was the discovery in 1930 of the Vorkuta deposit of high-quality hard coal on the territory of the Pechora coal basin by a party of the Institute of Geological Mapping, consisting of geologists N. N. Jordansky and G. A. Chernov ^{[21, pp. 32-34]}.

The discovery of industrial reserves of oil and coal reinforced the desire of the Soviet government to develop this territory. The Decree of the Supreme Economic Council of the USSR "On the development of the fuel base in the Northern Territory" in 1931 provided for extensive exploration work for oil, coal and other minerals, which were assigned to the Ukhta-Pechora correctional labor camp. In 1931, the first mine was laid on the right bank of the Vorkuta River, the prisoners began mining coal, and also expanded the geography of geological prospecting. These events marked the beginning of the industrial development of the Pechora coal basin ^{[22, pp. 1-3]}.

The activities of the USSR Academy of Sciences played an important role in the study of this area of the European North. The scientific and research basis for the industrial development of this territory was determined by the work of a complex expedition – the Pechora brigade of the Polar Commission of the USSR Academy of Sciences, which took place in 1933 under the leadership of Academician A. P. Karpinsky. The findings of the scientists made it possible to form a scientific basis for further work on the search for valuable minerals and showed the possibility of discovering enormous natural resources in the Pechora River basin, subject to further intensive geological exploration. This became the basis for the formation of long-term projects for the study and development of this territory and contributed to the inclusion of the natural resources of the Pechora River basin in the national economic system of the USSR ^[23].

The territory of the Kola Peninsula played a significant role in the industrial development of the USSR. The discovery of apatite-nepheline deposits in the 1920s by the expeditions of Academician A. E. Fersman, the main source for fertilizer production, determined the leading position of this territory in the country's raw material balance. The resolution "On the Khibiny apatite-nepheline deposits" of the Economic Council of the RSFSR in 1929 recognized their primary importance for meeting the needs of the entire USSR ^{[24, p. 286]}.

The document prescribed for the next two years the laying of apatite mines, an enrichment plant, and the expansion of work on scientific research of apatites and other minerals of the Khibinsky deposit. For the development and exploitation of Khibiny apatites, the Apatite Trust of national significance was organized. The extraction of apatite-nepheline ores, which began at the turn of the 1920s and 1930s, with ice-free ports on the shores of the Barents Sea and the Murmansk Railway, were reliable economic prerequisites for the further development of industry on the peninsula.

The establishment of state objectives for the inclusion of the mineral base of this territory in the country's economy led to the expansion of research activities on the Kola Peninsula through the USSR Academy of Sciences. Since 1928, systematic research has been carried out by the Kola Integrated Expedition of the USSR Academy of Sciences, created on the initiative of Academician A. E. Fersman. She was tasked with conducting comprehensive studies of the peninsula's natural resources and assessing their potential for inclusion in the economic development of the USSR. The expedition's activities were linked to plans for socialist construction and colonization on the peninsula ^{[25, pp. 29-51]}.

The staff of the USSR Academy of Sciences, together with specialists from the Leningrad Geological Exploration Trust and the Apatit Trust, conducted geological research and exploration on the vast territory of the Kola Peninsula. Despite the fact that most of the research work was still concentrated in the Khibiny massif area, where a large mining center was formed, during this period the prospect of expanding the peninsula's resource base by exploring the territories of Monche, Volchaya, Chun and Lovozersk tundras was determined. Huge mineral resources were found in these areas of the peninsula, including the largest deposits of copper, nickel, aluminum ores, ceramic raw materials, building materials, limestones, and rare earth elements. In 1935, construction of the largest metallurgical copper-nickel combine was started on the basis of the deposits of copper-nickel ores of the Monche Tundra ^{[26, l. 15-16; 27, l. 1-5]}.

By the end of the 1930s, the mineral resources of the Kola Peninsula, discovered and explored by scientists and researchers, began to play an exceptional role in the economy of the peninsula, where a powerful mining complex began to be created, including the operation of a mining and processing plant in Khibiny for the exploitation of apatite-nepheline deposits, the construction of a copper-nickel combine in Moncha Tundra, which laid the foundations for a non-ferrous metallurgy of the peninsula. By the end of the 1930s, the intensive use of the mineral resources of the Kola Peninsula turned this territory into the most industrially developed area beyond the Arctic Circle, where the largest center of the mining, chemical and metallurgical industries of the USSR was formed.

During the period of implementation of the tasks of industrialization, the problem of the mineral resource potential of the territory of Karelia, most of which consisted of non-metallic raw materials, stone building materials and pegmatites, received a scientifically based basis. The urgent need of the USSR industry for such rare elements as quartz, feldspar and mica has led, since the 1920s, to the main activity of scientists in the study of this territory - the search for pegmatite veins. The result of the joint activities of the Geological Committee and the Scientific Research Institute for the Study of the North was the discovery of large reserves of pegmatites in the north of Karelia by the end of the 1920s. The beginning of their industrial exploitation by the Karelgranit Trust in 1929 identified this area as the main base of ceramic materials for the USSR ^{[28, p. 79]}.

The Murmansk Railway, which stretched throughout Karelia and connected it both with the center of the country and with the industrially developing Kola Peninsula, played a significant role in the development of this territory. The future construction of the White Sea-Baltic Canal, which was supposed to connect the Baltic Sea with the Soviet North, also opened up further prospects for integrating Karelia's raw material potential into the country's economy. The construction of this facility has become one of the most important tasks of the first five-year plan, which led to an increase in the pace of scientific research.

At the turn of the 1920s and 1930s, the staff of the Geological Committee and then the Leningrad Geological Exploration Trust continued their systematic research, searching for minerals. As a result of surveys led by geologists V. M. Timofeev, P. A. Borisov, N. G. Sudovikov, Yu. S. Neustruev and others, deposits of the rare mineral shungite, ferrous, non-ferrous and rare metals, mining raw materials and building materials were identified and studied in Karelia. Together, this has become a solid base for the further industrial development of the region ^{[29, p. 54; 27]}. The problem of pegmatites has also developed significantly. Exploration and calculation of significant reserves of pegmatite raw materials in the area of the Chupinsky deposit became the basis for the start of the operation of the only pegmatite plant in the USSR in Kondopoga, Karelian ASSR, commissioned in 1938. Mica-quartz-feldspar raw materials from Karelian pegmatites acquired all-Union significance ^{[30, pp. 80-86; 31, pp. 61-64]}.

Nevertheless, in comparison with other regions of the European North of the USSR, Karelia's mining industry developed at a very slow pace in the 1930s, due to the limited funds allocated by the Soviet government to develop the infrastructure of the border region in the face of increasing military threats.

The outlined goals of the industrial development of the USSR have increased the attention of the state and science to the study of the natural resources of the Arctic islands. The priorities and directions of research activities in the Arctic were determined during this period, first of all, by the needs of the economy in the conditions of industrialization. One of its goals was the development of the Northern Sea Route, the development of which was associated with the most important domestic economic and foreign policy objectives of the state. This vector was developed in all corners of the Soviet Arctic, but to a large extent in its European sector, where intensive research was conducted on the Novaya Zemlya archipelago and the Vaigach Islands, whose mineral resources in the future were designed to ensure uninterrupted traffic along the Northern Sea Route.

The most promising industrially was fr. Vaigach. In 1927, an employee of the Geological Committee, A. K. Shankman, identified industrial reserves of polymetallic ores on the island and for the first time raised the question of the possibility of their exploitation ^{[32, l. 10]}. Since 1930, the OGPU's Vaigach expedition began exploring the island, while simultaneously conducting industrial exploration of lead-zinc deposits and mining ore in Varneka Bay. Geological research and exploration work on the island and in the surrounding areas was carried out by repressed scientists under the leadership of Professor P. V. Wittenburg together with geologist N. A. Kulik, an employee of the USSR Academy of Sciences. The most important result of this activity was the discovery by 1932 of a powerful deposit of the valuable mineral fluorite, widely used in the USSR aluminum industry, at Pai-Khoi at the mouth of the Amderma River. Its industrial development began with the efforts of the Vaigach expedition in 1934 ^{[33, pp. 265-269; 34, 35]}. By the end of the 1930s, the difficult working conditions in the Arctic zone and the extraction of raw materials in such remote Arctic regions led to the abandonment of further industrial exploration of the explored subsurface and the organization of industrial facilities on the island. Vaigach.

In the early 1930s, the staff of the All-Union Arctic Institute and the Leningrad Geological Exploration Trust significantly expanded the geography of exploration on Novaya Zemlya. Deposits of asphaltites, asbestos, copper and lead-zinc ores, etc. were identified in poorly explored areas of the archipelago under the general scientific guidance of geologist M. M. Ermolaev. Nevertheless, by the mid-1930s, the scientists' research had not yielded significant practical results. Industrial reserves of minerals in Novaya Zemlya could not be identified ^{[36, 37, L. 1-2]}. The mass repressions that unfolded after 1937, as a result of which a significant number of employees of the All-Union Arctic Institute were arrested, as well as the lack of data on the presence of industrial deposits in the archipelago, actually led to the curtailment of scientific activities in Novaya Zemlya ^{[38, l. 4-5]}. There was a long break in the exploration of the archipelago. The subsequent events of the Great Patriotic War provided Novaya Zemlya with a new role as the USSR's military-strategic foothold in the Arctic zone.

The process of socialist industrialization increased the importance of the territory of the European North of the USSR as a significant resource area. The solution of large-scale state tasks for the scientific and technological development of the country necessitated the widespread use of the rich mineral resources of this territory in the development of the economy, which, in turn, determined the expansion and acceleration of scientific activity in this region. By the end of the 1930s, the identified and studied mineral deposits and detailed geological exploration, combined with the results of scientific research in the 1920s, provided a powerful raw material base for the development of the mining industry in the European North of the USSR, which formed one of the foundations of the country's industrial development. This is evidenced by the work of large industrial facilities – the Kola Mining Complex for the extraction of apatite-nepheline ores; the Copper-nickel plant based on the Monche-Tundra ores; the mining infrastructure for oil production in the Ukhta region and coal in the Pechora basin; the Pegmatite plant in Karelia; the development of the Amderma fluorite mine, etc. The practical results obtained by the scientific community determined the significant role of the European North of the USSR in the country's economy. The study of the mineral resource potential of this territory has become a huge contribution of scientists to the formation of the raw material base of the entire Northwestern part of the country, as well as to the achievement of energy and resource security of the Union on the eve of the events of World War II.

The article was prepared as part of the state assignment on research and development No. 1022041400015-8-6.1.1 "Science in the North of Russia as the basis for sustainable development of the regions of the European North and the Arctic zone of the Russian Federation".