Chapter 297
Yuri only knew that such a secret city was to be built in the Krasnoyarsk Territory, but he did not know the purpose of this city because he had not yet obtained the specific and detailed plan.
In fact, if Yuri knew more about the Soviet Union in his previous life, he would know that this secret city would have an official name when the Soviet Union collapsed: Zelenogorsk. This was the place where the Soviet Union specialized in uranium enrichment when conducting nuclear weapons research. It was a very important part of the Soviet Union's entire nuclear weapons development plan.
Although he didn't know what the specific purpose of this secret city was, as the head of the Executive Bureau of the Disarmament Working Committee, Yuri actually didn't want to focus on the establishment of the secret city at present. In his opinion, the current focus of the Soviet state's work, in addition to the recovery and development of the national economy, should be the development of the Propyat River and Volga River basins, as well as the construction of various industrial and mining enterprises . As for heavy industry, especially heavy industry, it can be slowed down a little.
Although he didn't know much about the history of the Soviet Union in his previous life, after being in this world for so long and being at a high level of the national political power, Yuri has already had his own views on certain issues, and thus has formed some of his own positions and opinions.
At that time, the core leadership of the Soviet Union, including Stalin, was generally concerned about only a few issues: internally, there were issues of post-war economic reconstruction and recovery, various social and ethnic issues that emerged with the end of the war, the reduction of troops, the work arrangements for the new five-year plan, etc.; externally, there were issues of the Sovietization of Eastern European countries, the climax of the international communist movement that was likely to emerge rapidly after the war, the war penalties against Germany and Japan, the direction of relations with Western allies such as Britain and the United States, issues regarding Turkey and Iran, the establishment of the United Nations, and so on.
Among these issues, the most important one is the direction of relations with Western countries such as Britain and the United States. This issue directly affects all aspects of Soviet decision-making, even including decisions on internal construction.
Today, the general consensus of the Soviet core leadership is that in post-war diplomacy, they should try their best to coexist peacefully with Western countries such as Britain and the United States, create a peaceful and stable international environment, and create favorable conditions for domestic economic recovery and construction. But at the same time, they should also focus on improving their own military strength, especially the development of heavy industry closely related to the military industry, to ensure the Soviet military's strong strength in response to the ever-changing international environment.
Yuri couldn't say whether such views and positions were right or wrong, but based on his previous life's experiences and cognition, he always felt that something was not quite right, because such a position paid too much attention to the country's external environment. To put it bluntly, the country's major policies are determined by the external environment.
Marx's materialist view has been precisely discussed. Internal factors are the fundamental reason that determines the development of things, while external factors are secondary. At the same time, external factors can only play a role through internal factors.
From this point of view, the formulation of a country's major policies and guidelines should be based on the country's own basic conditions. First, it should do its utmost to develop the national economy and lay a solid domestic foundation before considering the issue of the external environment.
Looking back, China has obviously been doing this since the reform and opening up to the first twenty years of the 21st century. No matter how complex the external environment was, or how much targeting it suffered from the Americans, it just focused on its own economic development, and it did so for more than 30 years. It finally gained an international voice relying on the size of its economy.
At that time, especially in the 1990s and the early 21st century, wasn’t the international environment facing China complex? Wasn’t it dangerous? The collision between the US and China, the bombing of the Yugoslav embassy, the Yinhe incident, the Taiwan Strait crisis, etc., were enough to show how passive the international environment China was in at that time.
But even so, China at that time did not change its policies because of the complex and harsh international environment. It always maintained the main theme of low-key development and responded to various international frictions with various diplomatic rhetoric of protest and criticism. Finally, it survived and achieved the day of economic take-off.
As for the Soviet Union, it had focused its main attention on the international arena since before World War II, using the de facto "military-first" policy to deal with various international threats, trying to create an illusory prosperity of "you are strong, I am stronger", but ultimately failed due to its sluggish economy.
In fact, the Soviet Union is not the only country that has taken this path, but they all have a common problem, that is, economic collapse will inevitably lead to political instability, or at least, the entire country will appear very fragile. For example, Vietnam in the past, Albania, and North Korea.
In Yuri's view, the Soviet Union today should take advantage of the relatively peaceful international environment after the war, focus on developing the economy with all its strength, and abandon the pre-war policy of concentrating all its efforts on developing heavy industry to a limited extent. At least it should first solve agricultural problems and some light industry problems to a certain extent.
Even without the memory of his previous life, Yuri believed that with the end of World War II, another world war would not break out in the short term. Not to mention Britain and France, which had suffered heavy losses in the war, even the United States could not afford the cost of another war in the short term. Therefore, for a long period of time after the war, recovery and development were the main themes of the world, and war was just a means of threat at the negotiation table.
But then again, although Yuri is now in a high position, he has not yet entered the core leadership of the Soviet Union. Even if he enters, he probably won't have much say. He still needs to wait and gain experience. At least, when Comrade Stalin is alive, he must be humble and keep a low profile.
After finishing the cigarette in his hand, Yuri threw the butt out of the window. When he was about to turn around, he heard a noise in the valley not far away. He frowned and looked over, but saw that there was an accident on the mountain road leading in and out of the valley.
Perhaps because the road was slippery due to the rain, a group of prisoners carrying logs fell down the slope. A log that was more than five meters long and as thick as a man's arms rolled down the hillside, knocking and crushing seven or eight naked prisoners to the ground. As screams and wails rang out, the bright red blood, mixed with the gurgling rainwater on the slope, quickly flowed to the bottom of the valley. Looking at those who either fell or lay on their backs twitching on the ground, it was obvious that there was no hope of survival.
The guards who were originally standing on the top of the slope finally moved. Two soldiers wearing raincoats and carrying guns walked down carefully. They stood beside a prisoner who fell to the ground and looked at him, then talked to each other for a few words. Then, one of them took off the gun on his back, held it in his hand, pointed the sharp bayonet downward, and stabbed the prisoner who was lying on the ground and twitching in the back. He did not turn until he saw that the other person was no longer moving, and then turned and walked towards the other one.
Eight prisoners fell to the ground, each with a bayonet, no more, no less. During the whole process, hundreds or even thousands of prisoners in the nearby valley and on the hillside just watched. No one moved, no one spoke, they just watched numbly until the two guards shouted at them. Then a dozen people stumbled over, carried the dead people away, and sent them to the back of the hillside not far away. In the lush jungle behind the hillside, there was a large mass grave. In order to build the forward airport, the prisoners dug a large amount of earth from there, and the remaining earth pits were the best places to bury people.
Several years of war had already hardened Yuri's heart into a stone. The tragedy on the slope outside the house could not affect his mood. What's more, these Japanese were not good people at all. Although they seemed pitiful now, when they were in a strong position, they never showed pity to others.
Turning and walking to the only wooden table in the room, Yuri kicked the rough wooden stool beside the table, bent down and sat down, while reaching out to take a document on the table.
This document was recently drafted by him. It was a draft. According to this document, he planned to divide the 1.07 million Japanese prisoners of war and pioneer group members gathered in the Far East into 3,045 prisoner-of-war camps. These prisoner-of-war camps will be responsible for a large amount of construction work in the Far East and Siberia in the next five years.
Among the many projects, in addition to the task of building a secret city, there is also the task of building two sections of railways, namely the Taishet to Ust-Kut section and the Amur Komsomolsk-Soviet Port section.
Both sections of railway are part of the Baikal-Amur Railway, which is very important for ensuring the presence of the Soviet central government in the Far East. Considering that after the war, the Soviet Union will further strengthen its presence in the Far East and even the entire Pacific region, a series of development activities including railway construction and urban construction will inevitably be strengthened step by step. What Yuri did was just part of the planning.
The numbers of more than 3,000 prisoner-of-war camps were selected completely randomly, but among them, there was a prisoner-of-war camp numbered 2045 that received special attention from Yuri.
This prisoner-of-war camp is the smallest, with only 2,643 people. The day after tomorrow, all the prisoners in this camp will be collectively executed in Litovko, a small town 40 kilometers north of Khabarovsky. The crime is the massacre of Soviet civilians and prisoners of war during the war. The legal basis is the "Punishment Measures for Fascist Villains Who Killed Soviet Citizens, Massacred Soviet Civilians and Tortured Prisoners of War" promulgated by the Soviet government in 1943.
Although he was not very familiar with history in his previous life, Yuri would never forget the evil deeds of Unit 731. He never thought of letting these demons return to Japan safely.
