REPORTS EXPANSION OF USSR RAILROADS, ROADS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 21, 2011
• Sequence Number: 900
• Publication Date: February 14, 1950
• Content Type: REPORT

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22 : CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
50X1-HUM
l~ Rr .1
CLASSIFICATION C011PIDi.'IFPTAS. m,,.. -Ty
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY REPORT
INFORMATION FROM
FOREIGN DOCUMENTS OR RADIO BROADCASTS CD NO.
SUBJECT Transportatio.i -- Railroads and roads
HOW
WHERE
PUBLISHED Zu:?ich_
DATE
PUBLISHED I+ San 1950
LANGUAGE German
THIS DOCSNINT CONTAINS 147ORN0TTOR AFP/CTINI THE NATIONAL OIP05SS
OP THIS 0.11100 STATIN NITNIN TNS P1ANINS OF *50IOIIAS1 ACT CO
O. S. C.. Si ANO SI, AS ?910004. ITS TIAN/OISSIOM ON 4N1 STOELATION
O! ITS CONTENTS IN ANY S.PNSO TO AS USAVTNOEIE0O MELON IS l10
MI11110 OT LAW. OIPN00VCTION Op TNIS POOP IS PIOMIIITIO
Die Tat, No 2, 1949.
DATE DIST.
SUPPLEMENT TO
REPORT NO.
[An asterisk after locations indicates that the plac- coil ict he identified
and the German spelling was retained)
Not the least cause of the first defeats of the Soviet Union in the war
with Germany was to be found in an insufficient railroad network. On the .
other side, the German advance in the Soviet Union col;.apsed largely because
of the difficulties of maintaining any regular German supply on the Russian
railroads. The question of gauge was unimportant. The rmrmans effected the
conversion from Russian wide gauge to European standaxt gauge very quickly,
and during the German retreat the old gou6- was -ikewiae restored by the
During muddy periods Russian roads are little or no substitute for missing
railroad lines. During World War II this condition constituted not only a
disalvantage for the Germans, but it also hindered Soviet defense consider-
ably. A good roadnet rovers the aggrer.sor, out Lbe Suaiat r-- -ot Yr~ to
be so poor that it failed to be an advantage even for the Soviets.
Immediately after the expulsion of the German troops the Soviet Union
resolved not only to reconstruct its railroad and ooadnet, but to expand it
and to render it efficient for future warfare. More emphasis was placed on
the construction of new and the strengthening of old railroad lines than on
road construction, obviously because railroad construction is faster and
cheaper on the Russian plains than road construction.
The most important railroad lines are being expanded to four tracks.
The Moscow-Lenin.rad railrcad line is tbus being expanded to four tracks over
a period of 6 years, with German and US construction machinery being used
preponderantly. One hundred ninety kilometers of this line were completed
in 1947; at the end of 1948 this figure was said to have reached 320 kilo-
meters.
CLASSIFICATION
STATE NAVY NSW
I AR MY IXL AIR __jXL_ FBI
-
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22 : CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22 : CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
expansions are also in progress in southern and southwestern Russia. The
Kiev-L'vov railroad line has three tracks, two of which are wide gauge and
line, all lines around iIskov, the Poltava-Kiev, the railroad bridge across
the Volga River at Yaroslavl', the Kirovabad (46 E,"41 U -Shusha line, the
Several exanples may serve to explain this phase: an entirely new con-
necting railroad net, for freight traffic exclusively, has been created in
and. around Kiev (e.g., Kiev -Radomyshl', Kiev-Dymer, Kiev-Tripol'yc). A new
railroad net was also constructed north of the Caucasus, where large oil
fields are to ba exploited (e.g., the new double-track line from 'List' -Labinskaya
to Maykop, the Mozdok-Makhach line, the Mozdok-Moskaia* line. t'e Mineral'nyye
Vod; -Pyatigorak line, and the Medwjeschirr.k*-Te.-iizhbekskaya line). In this
region, however, various old railroad installations are quite obsolete and the
expansion may be expected to take some time.
Many uew railroad projects are in progress in the Donets Basin (e.g., the
Konstantinovka project, where numercan douola--trace lines have been constructed),
eastern Galicia (L'vov), and around Molotov. The latter now has a population
of 300,000 and possesses marshalling yard for the Siberian railroad. This yard
is the largest marshalling yard in the USSR. Much new railroad construction
_ th~~ 3f
industrial centers such as Basgaja* (Central Asia), Chelyabinsk, Troitsk(280
kilometers south of Chelyabinsk), Alapayevsk (62 E, 58 N), Karaganda (200
kilometers south of Omsk), Kuznetsk, and Stalinsk.
Among the other more important railroad lines which were completed be-
tween l9l6 _A l918 _nri wh ch .4ther cone art. large inriiia trial areas or are
of strategic importance, the following may be mentioned: Lugansk-Dnepropet-
rovsk, Roven'ki-Perwoso* (Perwoswanowka*), and Krjepkeja*-Novocherkassk in
the Donets Basin, Bobruysk-Mozyr', Kurgan-Shadrinsk (as feeder line to the
Trans Siberian Railroad), :,chucha*-Nukha (Transcaucasus, single track),
Mezen'-Pinega-Pinescbgaja* (Arctic Ocean), Orsk-Uralursprung)' (ore region),
t sk-Irendyk* (ore region), Balashov (43 E, 52 N)-Balanda-Atkarsk (45 E, 52 N),
notop-Kremenchug (double track, under construction), Mariupol'-Stalino-
Fokschani* (double track), Chelyabinsk-Skalnow* (West Siberia), Sary Tschegansk*
(northern shore of Lake Aral)-Akdschulpas*-Sapak*, Orenburg-Akdschulpas*-
Tashkent, Berezniki-Vyatka (Urals, with si;c new freight lines), Berdichev
(near Zhitomir)-Starokonstantinov, Podol'sk-Borovsk (Western Ukraine), Pskov-
Sokol.niki , Vyatka-Kazan' (w:th connections to the Siberian railroad), Bugul'ma
k
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22: CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22 : CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
Besides these railroad projects, measures for improvement of the most
important road connections are noteworthy. These projects progress consider-
ably slower because expensive foundations are used on USSR roads, therefore
making road bui].ding sore difficult and more expensive than railroad construc-
ti.on. The U:'3R roadnr.L - still wry poor tver:.rhere. Almost all bridges
east of the Urals are cuden. However, several large highways on the order
of the French Routes idationales and the German Autobahn en :lave been constructed
or are under construction, including the not-yet-completed Sverdlovsk-Molotov
highway acrosr, the Urals, which is being built by political prisoners; the
nndern, '-meter-wide K.ev-Kharkov-Poltava concrete road, of which 130 kilo-
meters have been completed; the 5-meter-wide Moscow-Kirovo (Ural) asphalt
road, which will be continued to Basgaja* (Central Asia); the Ivanovo-Moscow
highway, with two separate concrete lanes; the Bendery-Tiraspol' (Dnestr
hi Zh,,ny; tt cnnA oho-Ankn_KirnwnhnA f ir. r7n nrtoha it fo Vie... _..__ ..f v~r~. Wis..-d7
highway (asphalted, bridge over Kura River for 60-ton load); the Kiev-
Zhi.tomir highway (two concrete lanes, each 5 meters wide); the Moscoti.-izhev
highway (reconstructed.); the Kirsanov-Tambov-Koslow* highway (under construc-
tion); the Mogilev-Bykhov highway (5 meters wide, asphalted); the Mogilev-
Minsk and 11-Vil'nyus highways (planned; river bridge to Chausy with a
30-ten load capacity completed): the Kazan'-Tzhevsk highway (par+_ of +_re new
14-meter wide dual highway from Moscow to Sverdlovsk, which was begun in
may 1945 by German highway engineers); the Leningrad-Riga road (narrow, stone
road), the Rostov-Kislovodsk highway (8 meters wide); the Orel-Moscow high-
way (route changed; 7 meters wide); the Podol'sk-Moscow highway (expanded
to 20 meters width); the Uglich-Rybinsk road (12-meters-wide stone road;
completed in 1946); the Odessa-Tiraspol' highway (modern highway); the Odessa-
Ovidiopol' highway (parallel to a new railroad line), the Mogilev-Zhlobin
highway (grading begun), the Chistopol'-Kazan' highway (with a 40-ton bridge
across the Kama River), etc.
There are rumors about railroads which have been newly constructed or are
under construction in the Arctic regions and in northern Siberia, but it is not
possible to give exact data. The new large industrial towns in those regions,
some with a population of over 100,000, are frequently kept cut off from the
ingly electrified. Thus, the entire stretch from Bakal, near r'helyatinsk,
to Moscow has already been electrified.. The Moscow-Petrozavodsk double-track
line has likewise been electrified. Further railroad electrification to
planned, particularly in the Asiatic regions between Novosibirsk and Irkutsk.
However, lack of electric locomotives is hindering these plans.
a long time remain one of the countries least opened up by railroads. At
present emphasis is placed on greater capacity of the existing important
and have returned since, were informed in le:,cures -hout "democratic educa-
tion" that in the future atom war such railroads would bs invulnerable. The
railroads would, however, remain the most important medium of mass transpor-
tation.
t
50X1-HUM
a i ~r ~1
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22 : CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22 : CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1
hia.ny new construction projects will. only gradually become known. The
above data has been compiled from thousands of statements of returned Austrian
a and German prisoners of war and of numerous deserted Russian soldiers from
the occupation armies in Germ-tny and Austria. This data has been carefully
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/09/22: CIA-RDP80-00809A000600280900-1