SPECIALISTS IN RUSSIA

Hokitika Guardian, 13 January 1932, Page 3

SPECIALISTS IN RUSSIA

MANY GERMANS. HONOURS FOR BRITISH WORKERS. LONDON, November 26. The foreign specialist liras become a familiar figure in the Soviet Union during the last two or three years. Not only in the hotels of Moscow which cater to foreigners, hut in out-of-the-way places, far off the ordinary tourist beats, one encounters these imported engineers, technicians, and skilled labourers, sometimes working alone in a Soviet factory, mine, or large farm, sometimes' employed in large and small groups, says the Moscow correspondent of the “Observer.”

There are no precise statistics about the number of non-Russian engineers and skilled workers employed in Soviet enterprises; but it probably ranges between five and ten thousand. Germans are easily the most numerous among the individual nationalities, with Americans second.' Some of these foreign specialists came to Russia on individual contracts; some are sent by firms' which conclude so-called technical and agreements' 'with the Soviet authorities; others come for the purpose of installing the machinery and equipment which have been sold hv their firms.

American engineers and mechanics have been employed on such big construction projects as the;. D.nieperstroi hydro-electric power plant, the Stalingrad tractor factory, the Nizhni Novgorod automobile works, '• and the huge mew steel plants at Magnitogorsk, in the Urals,''and Kuznetsk, in Siberia. Germans have - been utilised largely in the chemical, steel, coalmining, and agricultural machinery industries.

On the whole this experiment in large scale foreign collaboration with the Eivo Year Plan has worked with reasonable smoothness, and a number of foreign experts, including the German engineer, Liebhardt, who invented a new coal-cutting method, the American engineer, MacDonald, and the British skilled worker, Monger, who has been employed since prerevolutionary times in the “Hammer •and Sickle” metal works in Moscow, '.have received special. Soviet decorations for meritorious service. Mr Monger enjoyed a further honour: his bust may be seen in the proletarian “Siegesallee” in Moscow’s chief amusement park, where a row of casts of the best Soviet workers was i»centlv erected. At the other extreme are a few foreigners who have been sent home because the Soviet authorities did . not. like./ conduct, and a. somewhat larger number who left on their own accord, because tncy were dissatisfied—with--Russian- conditions.

Of course' there ha s been a cernain amount of inevitable friction and misunderstanding. The chief Soviet complaints about some foreign specialists are that they are inclined to demand too many of the creature comforts that Russia cannot at present supply, especially outside the largest towns; that their attitude toward Russians is sometimes overbearing and that they do not adjust themselves to the condition created by the absence or scarcity of tools and supplies wfi?cn would he taken for granted in construction work in most other countries.

Apart from material deprivations, the foreigners, when they voice tnerr grievances, are apt to mention cases of bureaucratic red tape in offices and institutions, and sometimes complain that they are not given the work most suitable in view of their past training. A frequent American criticism is that Russian engineers, while highly trained theoretically, are occasionally lacking in the practical knack of getting things done, and are sometimes reluctant to do the rough, dirty manual work which the American engineer, however high his rating. takes for granted he must do when construction emergencies . arjse. One American of long Russian experience is fond of telling, in almost awestruck tones, the story of how he saw a Russian engineer come into a railroad depot and wait until a carpet was spread out before him before he would examine tlie wheel of a defective locomotive.