(UNTITLED)

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP07-02247R000200180002-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: January 12, 2017
• Document Release Date: June 29, 2011
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: September 14, 1952
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2011/06/29 :CIA-RDPO7-022478000200180002-9
THE PROVIDENCE SUNDAY JOURNAL, SEPTEMBER 14, 1932.
,Russians Cutting a 700-Mike Canal Through a Desert
h
ou can get a fairly good idea of
how huge the project is when you
remember that the Suez Canal is
only 103 miles long and the Panama
but slightly more than 50.
(spreading branches, it will total
Asian',more than 30,000 miles in length.
Xhrough the fiery sands and blister- Installation of a great transpor-
ing suns of the Kara Kum desert. tation system whereby freight can
'
'h/iOSCOW-(AP)-Far away in miles of desert. land.
distant central Asia, engineers; .Electrification of large
pre building a 700-mile long canal'~areas.
running from Takhia Tash, near the
sprawling foot of the Aral, Sea to
Krasnovodsk on the Caspian Sea.
Thousands of people have been
at work on it for months npw, ?~
since the Volga-Don Canal was fin-
ished, more engineers and Workers
have been shifted to the Turkmen.
S. Kalizhniuk, construction di-
zector of the huge project, reported
the labor tempo is being stepped up.
Last year, he said, the output per
worker constituted 140 per cent of
the norm-this year it has reached
161 per cent.
pected to accomplish in a regular
working day-is established before-
Hand. He is encouraged to better
this if he can and never to fall be-
h4nd it. The norm is considered 100,
as if workers are now doing 161,
that's quite a labor speedup.
;The new canal has several object-
'rues, all sweeping in scope and
~Illagination:
+ Naming of the treacherotti'
IMl~ters of the Amu Darya River.'" `j
i Several large hydroelectric sta-
tions at the various dams along the
,canal will generate enough power
,
to make it cheaper to plough b
,
y
be brought to and from these re-
mote areas with comparative ease.lelectricity in this part of Asia than
by tractor.
When diverted toward the. Cas-i When the canal is completed and
plan, the Amu Darya, only one-fifth {he irrigation system is at work,
of whose waters are now used for the Soviet Union's annual cotton
irrigation purposes, will irrigate 3,-(production is expected to expand to
120,000 acres of the desert and the ~i a great degree.
Caspian plain and will bring watery The Main Turkmen Canal is a
to more than 16 million acres ofcenter link in the USSR's big irri-
land in this area. gation campaign,
of 8,000,000 tons in the grai
of 480,000 tons of rice and of
000 tons of sugmr beets.
and the connection irrigatio
ects working they estimate
three million acres of desert
turned into cotton count
ture.'
The Kara Kum is one of th
f ~ ~~~ ,
~~, Approved For Release 2011/06/29 :CIA-RDPO7-022478000200180002-9
 Approved For Release 2011/06/29 :CIA-RDP07-022478000200180002-9
By a Stti'~iit of Eastern Europe
Th'power stations to be built ~ be made possible by the energy
under what is described in the Soviet generated by the new power stations,
press as "The Projects of Commu- whose output will be five to seven
times cheaper than that of stations
nism " are seven in number : two on working on coal or oil.
the Volga, near Kuibyshev and The benefits to be derived from the
Stalingrad, with a capacity of projects by agriculture are perhaps
2,000,OOOkw. and 1,700,000kw. respec- even more imposing than those which
tively ; one each on the Dnieper at will accrue to industrv. A network
Kakhovka and on the Don at Tsim- of irrigation canals, more than 2,800
lyansk (250,000kw, and 16Q000kw.) ; miles in length, will bring water to
and one on the Amu-Darya and two drought afflicted or desert. lands in
on the Turkmenian Canal, in Central the Ukraine, the Crimea, between the
Asia, with a total capacity of Volga and the Ural rivers in Kazakh-
100,000kw. According to Soviet stun, and in Turkmenistan. In many
estimates the combined annual out- of these networks the electric power
put of the two Volga power stations i from the new stations will be used to
will, at approximately 20,000 million pump water into the new canals. The
kilowatt hours, equal that of France total area to be thus irrigated or other-
and exceed that of Italy. ~~ wise supplied with water will, accord-
How does this fit into what is j ing to Soviet estimates, exceed
trial expansion ? In 1946 Mr Stalin
said in an election speech in his
Moscow constituency that Soviet
industry should aim within the next
fifteen years or so at an annual
production of 50,000.000 tons of iron,
60.000,000 tons of steel, 500 million
tons of coal, and 60.000.000 tons of oil.
~l'he most recent Soviet production
figures suggest that Soviet industry
has now gone about half of the way
towards attaining these goals. To
reach them, that is to double the
production of these materials within
the next ten years, would require as
momentous an industrial revolution
as any the ~,vorld has known.
SIBERIA'S SHARE
The basis of this revolution-or
rather of the "qualitative change " in
the Soviet economy, since the word
"revolution " must no longer be used
by Soviet economists with reference
to future developments in their own
country-is to be electric power. The
amount of electric power which
would be required by an industrial
organisation capable of producing
these vast masses of raw materials is
estimated to be in the region of
250,000 million kilowatt hours per
annum. Against this the Soviet
Union produced in 1951 about
100,000 million kilowatt hours,
while the new power stations
which are part of the projects,
and others which are being built
independently, can be expected
to yield about 50,000 million kilowatt
hours afier 1957, when the projects
are to be completed. This still leaves
Soviet industry about 100,000 million
kilowatt hours short of its estimated
requirements at the end of the next
ten years, and it is to be expected
that before long new hydro-electric
schemes on a scale even greater than
those already announced will be
made pl:blic. The Soviet Ministry of
Power Stations is, in fact, now
studying a plan for the diversion
southward of two of Siberia's largest
rivers, the Ob and the Yenisei,
which would bring much-needed
water to the deserts of Central Asia
and provide "white coal " for more
and bigger hydro-electric stations in
a region of vast and unexplored
industrial opportunity.
The more immediate industrial
significance of the projects is evident
from the fact that, in addition to
directing 50 per cent of their joint.
output to the Central (Moscow)
Region. the Kuibyshev and Stalingrad
stations will supply respectively 24
and 28 per cent of their power to
industrial objects in the Volga region.
This huge accretion of power'to .thesz
areas (whose industry in 1940 con- i
s~umed over 20 per cent of all coal
produced in the Soviet Union, and ~I,
have far-reaching effects on the'
geographical distribution of Soviet
industry. About 25 per cent of the
Soviet Union's population of some
two hundred millions now lives in
;' the Volga basin. The economic
r ~___ __11 L~.~...?..
Approved For Release 2011/06/29
nearly 200.000,000 acres similarly
brought under cultivation by the
human race in the whole of recorded
history. It is estimated that when
these plans have been carried out 35
per cent of the world's irrigated lands
-an area roughly equal to that
covered by Britain, Belgium, Holland,
Switzerland, and Denmark-will be in
the Soviet Union.
IRRIGATION
Soviet economists claim that the
newly irrigated lands twill provide
food, clothing, and living facilities for
100 million people-and still have
something to spare. The major part
of this area, particularly in European
Russia, has hitherto been used for the
cultivation of grain crops. This was
not economical from the point of view
of an enlightened agricultural policy,
because the climatic conditions in the
area, such as the abundance of sun-
light and warmth, mere more suitable
for the cultivation of industrial crops
yielding a higher cash return, such as
cotton and sugar beet. This, however,
was prevented by the lack of water.
It is now proposed to reduce the area
under grain crops in the Russian and
Ukrainian irrigated lands from 75 per
cent to about 40 per cent of the total,
increasing at the same time their
average yield to 39 bushels per acre.
The reduction of the area under grain,
combined with irrigation and the
introduction. of new agricultural
techniques, is expected to result in the
doubling of the total grain yield in the
lands affected.
At the same time, over 3.500,000
acres, both in Europe and in Central
Asia. are to be put under cotton, ~ ~
bringing the Soviet Union's total
cotton yield to about 7.500,000 tons,
which would double the figures 'for
1950. '
It should, perhaps, be emphasised
that the information on which this
article is based comes from Russian
publications, many of them of a propa-
ganda nature, and that in many cases
the figures quoted here are hopeful
estimates made by Soviet economists.
While there is no reason to doubt that
the scope of the projects is truly
gigantic, their economic effects may
fall somewhat short of expectations.
However, the change in the distribu-
tion of Soviet indu>try and agricul-
ture, which will be among the most
important consequences of the pro-
jects, wily. not be affected by small
failures here and there.
For the next few years Soviet
industrial resources will be strained
to the utmost-as they have been
since the Revolution-in manufac-
turing supplies for the projects and
for other purposes. To say this, how-
ever, is not to support the argument
that because Russia is building these
two huge power stations on the Volga
and several smaller stations else-
where she might not be able to devote
a great deal of her resources to the
expansion of her heavy and arma-
ments industries. The construction of
the Kuibyshev power station-the
lo,?no~+ of oil-ic +n nmv nnly
CIA-RDP07-022478000200180002-9
"12631.