Testaments of Ilyich. As it was

Testaments of Ilyich(or Lenin's testaments) - a phrase popular in Soviet times, which indicated that the Soviet country was living and developing along the path outlined by its founder Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. Sometimes Lenin’s last articles and notes were considered testaments; in other cases, a wider range of works were classified as testaments. Some of Lenin's quotes have gained particular popularity as testaments, for example: “Study, study, study, as the great Lenin bequeathed.” During the years of democratization, Lenin’s behest to remove Stalin from the post of Secretary General surfaced and became the subject of discussion. It was also discussed that Lenin may have bequeathed something completely different from what socialist construction led to. Official propaganda claimed that the country's leaders strictly followed the precepts, so they were invariably called “faithful Leninists.” Some communist parties (Yugoslavia, China) were criticized for deviating from Lenin's precepts. The name “Testaments of Ilyich” was assigned to a significant number of objects: plants and factories, state farms and collective farms.

Stalin and post-Stalin period

The concept of “Lenin’s covenants” was introduced into circulation by J.V. Stalin, who in a speech at the 2nd Congress of Soviets said:

When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us to hold high and keep in purity the great title of party member. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...) When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us to preserve the unity of our party like the apple of our eye. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...) When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us to preserve and strengthen the dictatorship of the proletariat. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will not spare our strength in order to fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...) When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us to strengthen with all our might the alliance of workers and peasants. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...) When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us to strengthen and expand the union of republics. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...) When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us loyalty to the principles of the communist international. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will not spare our lives in order to strengthen and expand the union of workers of the whole world - the communist international! (...)

A year later, Stalin repeated the term in a short article “Working women and peasant women, fulfill Ilyich’s commandments!”:

A year ago, when he left us, the great leader and teacher of the working people, our Lenin, left us behests and showed us the path along which we should go towards the final victory of communism. Fulfill these behests of Ilyich, working women and peasant women! Raise your children in the spirit of these covenants! Comrade Lenin left us a behest to strengthen the alliance of workers and peasants with all our might. Strengthen this union, working women and peasant women! Comrade Lenin taught the working people to support the working class in its struggle against the bourgeoisie, internal and external. Remember this covenant, working women and peasant women! Support the power of the working class, which is building a new life! Comrade Lenin taught us to hold high the banner of the Communist Party, the leader of all the oppressed. Rally around this party, workers and peasants - it is your party! On the day of the anniversary of Ilyich’s death, the party gives a cry - wider road for the working woman and peasant woman who are building a new life together with the party.

In the post-Stalin period, the terms “Lenin’s Course” and “Ilyich’s Testaments” were often used to contrast the methods of Lenin and Stalin. At the same time, in late Soviet times, this began to be called everything that seemed “democratic”, different from “totalitarianism”, which was associated with Stalin.

Usage examples

• “Working Moscow”, January 20, 1925: Lenin's Testament - attention to children- We do it to the best of our ability. We recently opened a kindergarten. The RCP cell put a lot of care and love into its organization. The kids feel great in the garden... We can safely say that these children are receiving a truly healthy upbringing to Ilyich's behests.
• The party is dear. “Pravda”, January 21, 1939: We will go, Comrade Lenin, // Po your covenants, // Lenin’s truth is walking // All over the world. // And in our native country, collective farms // Will grow everywhere. // And you, Comrade Lenin, // Will be forever remembered!
• Regimental Commissar N. Osipov. Just and Unjust Wars: Faithful to Lenin's behests and Stalin’s instructions, the Red Army will cross the borders of the aggressor, crush the enemy with the power of its weapons and with an armed hand will help the workers of the aggressor countries to overthrow capitalist slavery.
• Bolshevik daring. “Pravda”, January 21, 1939: Underground gasification is Leninism in action, the embodiment of one of the geniuses Lenin's Testaments. On May 4, 1913, Lenin’s short article “One of the Great Victories of Technology” appeared in the Pravda newspaper. Lenin responded to the message about the discovery of a method for directly extracting gas from coal seams. In the idea of ​​underground gasification, V.I. Lenin saw a “giant technical revolution”, saw the opportunity to “use twice the share of energy contained in coal...” “The revolution in industry caused by this discovery,” Lenin predicted, “will be enormous.”
• Valentin Kataev. The party is leading us. “Izvestia”, March 8, 1953: Over the tomb of the immortal Lenin, Stalin took a great oath to sacredly fulfill Ilyich's behests. Over the tomb of the immortal Stalin, we take a great oath to sacredly fulfill his behests.
• To the fields and farms. “Pravda”, June 29, 1971: Boys and girls who graduated from high school this year came to the ancient Azov village of Peshkovo from all over the Azov region. Why in Peshkovo? Yes, because on the collective farm "Testaments of Ilyich" The famous grain grower, Hero of Socialist Labor Fyodor Yakovlevich Kanivets lives and works.
• Solemn promise of a pioneer of the Soviet Union: “I, (last name, first name), joining the ranks of the All-Union Pioneer Organization named after Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, in the face of my comrades, solemnly promise: to passionately love and take care of my Motherland, to live, as the great Lenin bequeathed, as the Communist Party teaches, as required by the Laws of the Pioneers of the Soviet Union.”

Popular testament quotes

• Study, study, study. It is a common misconception that Lenin said this phrase at the III All-Russian Congress of the RKSM on October 2, 1920. In fact, although he spoke in this speech about the need to learn communism, he did not repeat the word “learn” three times. But in the article “The Retrograde Direction in Russian Social Democracy” (z, published in g) he used the following repetition:

At a time when educated society is losing interest in honest, illegal literature, a passionate desire for knowledge and socialism is growing among the workers, real heroes stand out among the workers, who - despite the ugly conditions of their lives, despite the stultifying hard labor in the factory - find in themselves so much character and willpower that study, study and study and develop ourselves into conscious social democrats, “workers’ intelligentsia.”

We need to set ourselves the task of updating our state apparatus at all costs: firstly - to study, secondly - to study and thirdly - to study and then check that science does not remain a dead letter or a fashionable phrase in our country (and this, let’s face it, happens especially often in our country), that science really enters into flesh and blood, turns into an integral element of everyday life in a completely and real way.

...every moment free from combat activity, from war, we must use for study, and first of all. The entire party and all layers of Russia prove this with their thirst for knowledge. This desire for learning shows that the most important task for us now is: study and study.

Master science, forge new cadres of Bolsheviks - specialists in all branches of knowledge, study, study, study in the most stubborn way - that is now the task.

Poster by Alexander Lemeschenko “GOELRO Plan”

• Communism is Soviet power plus electrification of the entire country. According to this instruction, Ilyich's light bulbs were lit throughout Russia. The phrase was said in the speech “Our external and internal situation and tasks of the party” at the Moscow provincial conference of the RCP (b) in 1920:

Communism is Soviet power plus electrification of the entire country, because without electrification it is impossible to raise industry... Communism presupposes Soviet power as a political body that gives the opportunity to the mass of the oppressed to do all things - without this communism is impossible... This ensures the political side, but the economic one can be ensured only when there is truly a Russian proletarian state all the threads of a large industrial machine, built on the foundations of modern technology, will be concentrated, and this means electrification, and for this we need to understand the basic conditions for the use of electricity and, accordingly, understand industry and agriculture.

• Less is more.
• Of all the arts, cinema is the most important for us..

V. I. Lenin, in a conversation with A. V. Lunacharsky in February 1922, “once again emphasized the need to establish a certain proportion between fascinating films and scientific ones.” Vladimir Ilyich, A.V. Lunacharsky writes in his memoirs, told me that the production of new films, imbued with communist ideas, reflecting Soviet reality, must begin with a chronicle, which, in his opinion, the time for the production of such films may not yet be it has arrived. “If you have a good chronicle, serious and educational pictures, then it doesn’t matter that to attract the public some useless film, more or less of the usual type, will be used. Of course, censorship is still needed. Counter-revolutionary and immoral films should not take place.” To this Vladimir Ilyich added: “As you get back on your feet thanks to proper management, and perhaps, with the general improvement of the country’s situation, you receive a certain loan for this business, you will have to expand production more widely, and especially promote healthy cinema in the masses in the city, and even more so in the countryside... You must firmly remember that of all the arts, cinema is the most important for us” (“Soviet Cinema” No. 1-2, 1933, p. 10).

Full composition of writings. - 5th ed. - T.44. - P.579

Lenin's last works

In December 1922, Lenin's health condition deteriorated sharply. During this period, however, he dictated several notes: “Letter to the Congress”, “On giving legislative functions to the State Planning Committee”, “On the issue of nationalities or “autonomization”, “Pages from the diary”, “On cooperation”, “ About our revolution (regarding N. Sukhanov’s notes)”, “How can we reorganize the Rabkrin (Proposal to the XII Party Congress)”, “Less is better”.

“Letter to the Congress” - Lenin’s testament

The “Letter to the Congress” dictated by Lenin () is often considered as Lenin’s testament. Some believe that this letter contained Lenin's real will, which Stalin later deviated from. Supporters of this point of view believe that if the country had developed along a truly Leninist path, many problems would not have arisen. The “Letter to the Congress” includes the following provisions:

• Increasing the number of members of the Central Committee to several dozen or even hundreds.
• Central Committee members such as Stalin and Trotsky are central to the issue of sustainability. The relationship between them constitutes more than half the danger of a split.
• Comrade Stalin, having become Secretary General, concentrated immense power in his hands, and I am not sure whether he will always be able to use this power carefully enough.
• Comrade Trotsky is perhaps the most capable person in the present Central Committee, but also overly grasping with self-confidence and excessive enthusiasm for the purely administrative side of the matter.
• These two qualities of two outstanding leaders of the modern Central Committee can inadvertently lead to a split.
• The October episode of Zinoviev and Kamenev, of course, was not an accident.
• Bukharin is not only the most valuable and largest theoretician of the party, he is also rightfully considered the favorite of the entire party, but his theoretical views can very doubtfully be classified as completely Marxist, because there is something scholastic in him (he never studied and, I think, never understood quite dialectic).
• Pyatakov is a man of undoubtedly outstanding will and outstanding abilities, but he is too keen on administration to be relied upon in a serious political matter.
• A few dozen workers, being part of the Central Committee, will be able, better than anyone else, to check, improve and recreate our apparatus.
• Stalin is too rude, and this shortcoming, quite tolerable in the environment and in communications between us communists, becomes intolerable in the position of General Secretary. Therefore, I suggest that the comrades consider a way to move Stalin from this place and appoint another person to this place, who in all other respects differs from Comrade. Stalin has only one advantage, namely, more tolerant, more loyal, more polite and more attentive to his comrades, less capriciousness, etc. This circumstance may seem like an insignificant detail. But I think that from the point of view of protecting against a split and from the point of view of what I wrote above about the relationship between Stalin and Trotsky, this is not a trifle, or it is such a trifle that can become decisive.

Thus, the “Letter to the Congress” was rather of a recommendatory nature, although Nadezhda Krupskaya subsequently used the text of the “Letter” as direct evidence against Stalin, speaking about the mandatory implementation of the will of Lenin as the first socialist leader.

Implementation of Lenin's plan for building socialism in the USSR

Party documents, scientific works and educational materials of the Soviet period interpreted the development of the USSR after Lenin's death as "the implementation of Lenin's plan for building socialism." The position on the possibility of building socialism in a separate country (in contrast to the world revolution originally assumed by the classics of Marxism) is one of the main provisions of Leninism. The articles in which a plan for building socialism was developed were usually listed as “State and Revolution”, “Immediate tasks of Soviet power”, “Economics and politics in the era of the dictatorship of the proletariat”, “Better less is better”, “On cooperation”. The following main stages in the implementation of Lenin's plan were identified:

• Socialist industrialization. Although the course towards industrialization was announced after Lenin's death by the XIV Party Congress in December 1925, it was often pointed out that this course was a continuation of Lenin's GOELRO plan.
• Cooperation of the peasantry. Assessing the role of the peasantry in the revolution was the subject of many of Lenin's works. One of the first acts of Soviet power was the Decree on Land. During the Civil War, peasants were forced to share food with workers through policies

Description

Zavety Ilyich is an urban-type settlement in the Sovetsko-Gavansky district of the Khabarovsk Territory of Russia.

Population 8527 people.

Geographical position

Located in the eastern part of the region, 7 km north of Sovetskaya Gavan, on the shore of Postovaya Bay, Sovetskaya Gavan Bay. The distance to the nearest railway station Sovgavan-Sortirovochnaya is 3 km.

History of the village

Originally - the fishing village of Novoastrakhanskoye, founded in the early 1920s. Then it was renamed Zavet Ilyich. The status of an urban-type settlement has been since 1960, after being separated from the city of Sovetskaya Gavan. During the 2nd World War and post-war years, it was a large naval base of the Pacific Fleet, the headquarters of the North Pacific Flotilla, then the 7th Navy and the Sakhalin Flotilla. The naval base included surface ships, submarines (including nuclear-powered ones), and coastal naval forces (many support units and marines). The garrison also included the air defense forces of the entire coast (345th Air Defense Brigade) and the Navy fighter aviation regiment (41st IAP, Postovaya airfield), later reassigned to the 11th Air Defense Army, military builders, 105th automobile repair plant, dairy plant, confectionery shop, printing house of the newspaper “On Guard of the Motherland”. With the collapse of the USSR, the number of military personnel decreased, and the collapse and degradation of the village began.

In the 21st century, what remained of the once large sea garrison was the 38th separate division of water area security ships, consisting of two small anti-submarine ships of Project 1124 and three minesweepers. Almost all of the “Stalinist” houses, as well as several relatively new five-story buildings, have been abandoned and turned into ruins. A large number of service buildings within the boundaries of the village were abandoned and destroyed, and buildings on the Menshikov Peninsula were also completely destroyed - the village is essentially a huge set for films about the war.

Economy

The city-forming organization of the village is the naval base (currently the OVR division).

“Testaments of Ilyich”(or "Lenin's Testaments") is an expression popular in Soviet times, which indicated that the Soviet country was living and developing along the path outlined by its founder Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. Sometimes Lenin’s last articles and notes were considered testaments; in other cases, a wider range of works were classified as testaments. Some of Lenin's quotes have gained particular popularity as testaments, for example: “Study, study, study, as the great Lenin bequeathed.” During the years of democratization, Lenin’s behest to remove Stalin from the post of Secretary General surfaced and became the subject of discussion. It was also discussed that Lenin may have bequeathed something completely different from what socialist construction led to. Official propaganda claimed that the country's leaders strictly followed the precepts, so they were invariably called “faithful Leninists.” Some communist parties (Yugoslavia, China) were criticized for deviating from Lenin's precepts. Already in 1925, the Monument to the Testaments of Ilyich was erected in Kyiv. During the years of Soviet power, the name “Testaments of Ilyich” was assigned to a significant number of objects: plants and factories, state farms and collective farms.

Stalin and post-Stalin period

The concept of “Lenin’s covenants” was introduced into circulation by J.V. Stalin, who in a speech at the 2nd Congress of Soviets said:

When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us to hold high and keep in purity the great title of party member. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...)

When leaving us, Comrade Lenin bequeathed to us to preserve the unity of our party like the apple of our eye. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...)

When Comrade Lenin left us, he bequeathed to us to preserve and strengthen the dictatorship of the proletariat. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will not spare our strength in order to fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...)

When Comrade Lenin left us, he bequeathed to us to strengthen with all our might the alliance of workers and peasants. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...)

When Comrade Lenin left us, he bequeathed to us to strengthen and expand the union of republics. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will fulfill this commandment of yours with honor! (...)

When Comrade Lenin left us, he bequeathed to us loyalty to the principles of the communist international. We swear to you, Comrade Lenin, that we will not spare our lives in order to strengthen and expand the union of workers of the whole world - the communist international! (...)

A year later, Stalin repeated the term in a short article “Working women and peasant women, fulfill Ilyich’s commandments!”:

A year ago, when he left us, the great leader and teacher of the working people, our Lenin, left us behests and showed us the path along which we should go towards the final victory of communism. Fulfill these behests of Ilyich, working women and peasant women! Raise your children in the spirit of these covenants!

Comrade Lenin left us a behest to strengthen the alliance of workers and peasants with all our might. Strengthen this union, working women and peasant women!

Comrade Lenin taught the working people to support the working class in its struggle against the bourgeoisie, internal and external. Remember this covenant, working women and peasant women! Support the power of the working class, which is building a new life!

Comrade Lenin taught us to hold high the banner of the Communist Party, the leader of all the oppressed. Rally around this party, workers and peasants - it is your party!

On the day of the anniversary of Ilyich’s death, the party gives a cry - wider road for the working woman and peasant woman who are building a new life together with the party.

In the post-Stalin period, the terms “Lenin’s Course” and “Ilyich’s Testaments” were often used to contrast the methods of Lenin and Stalin. At the same time, in late Soviet times, this began to be called everything that seemed “democratic”, different from “totalitarianism”, which was associated with Stalin.

Usage examples

• : Lenin's Testament - attention to children- We do it to the best of our ability. We recently opened a kindergarten. The RCP cell put a lot of care and love into its organization. The kids feel great in the garden... We can safely say that these children are receiving a truly healthy upbringing to Ilyich's behests.
• : We will go, Comrade Lenin, // Po your covenants, // Lenin’s truth is walking // All over the world. // And in our native country, collective farms // Will grow everywhere. // And you, Comrade Lenin, // Will be forever remembered!
• : Faithful to Lenin's behests and Stalin’s instructions, the Red Army will cross the borders of the aggressor, crush the enemy with the power of its weapons and with an armed hand will help the workers of the aggressor countries to overthrow capitalist slavery.
• : Underground gasification is Leninism in action, the embodiment of one of the geniuses Lenin's Testaments. On May 4, 1913, Lenin’s short article “One of the Great Victories of Technology” appeared in the Pravda newspaper. Lenin responded to the message about the discovery of a method for directly extracting gas from coal seams. In the idea of ​​underground gasification, V.I. Lenin saw a “giant technical revolution”, saw the opportunity to “use twice the share of energy contained in coal...” “The revolution in industry caused by this discovery,” Lenin predicted, “will be enormous.”
• Valentin Kataev. : Over the tomb of the immortal Lenin, Stalin took a great oath to sacredly fulfill Ilyich's behests. Over the tomb of the immortal Stalin, we take a great oath to sacredly fulfill his behests.
• : Boys and girls who graduated from high school this year came to the ancient Azov village of Peshkovo from all over the Azov region. Why in Peshkovo? Yes, because on the collective farm "Testaments of Ilyich" The famous grain grower, Hero of Socialist Labor Fyodor Yakovlevich Kanivets lives and works.
• Solemn promise of a pioneer of the Soviet Union: “I, (last name, first name), joining the ranks of the All-Union Pioneer Organization named after Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, in the face of my comrades, solemnly promise: to passionately love and take care of my Motherland, to live, as the great Lenin bequeathed, as the Communist Party teaches, as required by the Laws of the Pioneers of the Soviet Union.”

Popular testament quotes

• Study, study, study. It is a common misconception that Lenin said this phrase at the III All-Russian Congress of the RKSM on October 2, 1920. In fact, although he spoke in this speech about the need to learn communism, he did not repeat the word “learn” three times. But in the article “The Retrograde Direction in Russian Social Democracy” (z, published in g) he used the following repetition:

At a time when educated society is losing interest in honest, illegal literature, a passionate desire for knowledge and socialism is growing among the workers, real heroes stand out among the workers, who - despite the ugly conditions of their lives, despite the stultifying hard labor in the factory - find in themselves so much character and willpower that study, study and study and develop ourselves into conscious social democrats, “workers’ intelligentsia.”

We need to set ourselves the task of updating our state apparatus at all costs: firstly - to study, secondly - to study and thirdly - to study and then check that science does not remain a dead letter or a fashionable phrase in our country (and this, let’s face it, happens especially often in our country), that science really enters into flesh and blood, turns into an integral element of everyday life in a completely and real way.

...every moment free from combat activity, from war, we must use for study, and first of all. The entire party and all layers of Russia prove this with their thirst for knowledge. This desire for learning shows that the most important task for us now is: study and study.

Master science, forge new cadres of Bolsheviks - specialists in all branches of knowledge, study, study, study in the most stubborn way - that is now the task.

• Communism is Soviet power plus electrification of the entire country. According to this instruction, Ilyich's light bulbs were lit throughout Russia. The phrase was said in the speech “Our external and internal situation and tasks of the party” at the Moscow provincial conference of the RCP (b) in 1920:

Communism is Soviet power plus electrification of the entire country, because without electrification it is impossible to raise industry... Communism presupposes Soviet power as a political body that gives the opportunity to the mass of the oppressed to do all things - without this communism is impossible... This ensures the political side, but the economic one can be ensured only when there is truly a Russian proletarian state all the threads of a large industrial machine, built on the foundations of modern technology, will be concentrated, and this means electrification, and for this we need to understand the basic conditions for the use of electricity and, accordingly, understand industry and agriculture.

• Less is more.
• Of all the arts, cinema is the most important for us..

V. I. Lenin, in a conversation with A. V. Lunacharsky in February 1922, “once again emphasized the need to establish a certain proportion between fascinating films and scientific ones.” Vladimir Ilyich, A.V. Lunacharsky writes in his memoirs, told me that the production of new films, imbued with communist ideas, reflecting Soviet reality, must begin with a chronicle, which, in his opinion, the time for the production of such films may not yet be it has arrived. “If you have a good chronicle, serious and educational pictures, then it doesn’t matter that to attract the public some useless film, more or less of the usual type, will be used. Of course, censorship is still needed. Counter-revolutionary and immoral films should not take place.” To this Vladimir Ilyich added: “As you get back on your feet thanks to proper management, and perhaps, with the general improvement of the country’s situation, you receive a certain loan for this business, you will have to expand production more widely, and especially promote healthy cinema in the masses in the city, and even more so in the countryside... You must firmly remember that of all the arts, cinema is the most important for us” (“Soviet Cinema” No. 1-2, 1933, p. 10).

Full composition of writings. - 5th ed. - T.44. - P.579

• Trade unions - school of communism.

Lenin's last works

In December 1922, Lenin's health condition deteriorated sharply. During this period, however, he dictated several notes: “Letter to the Congress”, “On giving legislative functions to the State Planning Committee”, “On the issue of nationalities or “autonomization”, “Pages from the diary”, “On cooperation”, “ About our revolution (regarding N. Sukhanov’s notes)”, “How can we reorganize the Rabkrin (Proposal to the XII Party Congress)”, “Less is better”.

“Letter to the Congress” - Lenin’s testament

The “Letter to the Congress” dictated by Lenin () is often considered as Lenin’s testament. Some believe that this letter contained Lenin's real will, which Stalin later deviated from. Supporters of this point of view believe that if the country had developed along a truly Leninist path, many problems would not have arisen. The “Letter to the Congress” includes the following provisions:

• Increasing the number of members of the Central Committee to several dozen or even hundreds.
• Central Committee members such as Stalin and Trotsky are central to the issue of sustainability. The relationship between them constitutes more than half the danger of a split.
• Comrade Stalin, having become Secretary General, concentrated immense power in his hands, and I am not sure whether he will always be able to use this power carefully enough.
• Comrade Trotsky is perhaps the most capable person in the present Central Committee, but also overly grasping with self-confidence and excessive enthusiasm for the purely administrative side of the matter.
• These two qualities of two outstanding leaders of the modern Central Committee can inadvertently lead to a split.
• The October episode of Zinoviev and Kamenev, of course, was not an accident.
• Bukharin is not only the most valuable and largest theoretician of the party, he is also legitimately considered the favorite of the entire party, but his theoretical views can very doubtfully be classified as completely Marxist, because there is something scholastic in him (he never studied and, I think, never understood quite dialectic).
• Pyatakov is a man of undoubtedly outstanding will and outstanding abilities, but he is too keen on administration to be relied upon in a serious political matter.
• A few dozen workers, being part of the Central Committee, will be able, better than anyone else, to check, improve and recreate our apparatus.
• Stalin is too rude, and this shortcoming, quite tolerable in the environment and in communications between us communists, becomes intolerable in the position of General Secretary. Therefore, I suggest that the comrades consider a way to move Stalin from this place and appoint another person to this place, who in all other respects differs from Comrade. Stalin has only one advantage, namely, more tolerant, more loyal, more polite and more attentive to his comrades, less capriciousness, etc. This circumstance may seem like an insignificant detail. But I think that from the point of view of protecting against a split and from the point of view of what I wrote above about the relationship between Stalin and Trotsky, this is not a trifle, or it is such a trifle that can become decisive.

Thus, the “Letter to the Congress” was rather of a recommendatory nature, although Nadezhda Krupskaya subsequently used the text of the “Letter” as direct evidence against Stalin, speaking about the mandatory implementation of the will of Lenin as the first socialist leader.

Implementation of Lenin's plan for building socialism in the USSR

Party documents, scientific works and educational materials of the Soviet period interpreted the development of the USSR after Lenin's death as "the implementation of Lenin's plan for building socialism." The position on the possibility of building socialism in a separate country (in contrast to the world revolution originally assumed by the classics of Marxism) is one of the main provisions of Leninism. The articles in which a plan for building socialism was developed were usually listed as “State and Revolution”, “Immediate tasks of Soviet power”, “Economics and politics in the era of the dictatorship of the proletariat”, “Better less is better”, “On cooperation”. The following main stages in the implementation of Lenin's plan were identified:

• Socialist industrialization. Although the course towards industrialization was announced after Lenin's death by the XIV Party Congress in December 1925, it was often pointed out that this course was a continuation of Lenin's GOELRO plan.
• Cooperation of the peasantry. Assessing the role of the peasantry in the revolution was the subject of many of Lenin's works. One of the first acts of Soviet power was the Decree on Land. During the Civil War, peasants were forced to share food with workers through the policy of surplus appropriation, and later the tax in kind. Lenin devoted several works to issues of cooperation in the countryside: “The Immediate Tasks of Soviet Power”, “Report on Work in the Village on March 23, 1919”, “On the Food Tax”, “On Cooperation”. Total collectivization was carried out after Lenin's death by decision of the XV Party Congress, held in December 1927.
• Cultural Revolution. The elimination of illiteracy and the construction of a public education system were also seen as the implementation of Lenin's ideas. It was noted that Lenin pointed to the need to study (or, more precisely, “learn communism,” as he did in “Tasks of Youth Unions”).

The idea of ​​socialist competition, which became a popular slogan in the USSR, was often attributed to Lenin. At the same time, they quoted the article “How to organize a competition?”, which stated:

Socialism not only does not extinguish competition, but, on the contrary, for the first time creates the opportunity to apply it truly widely, truly on a mass scale.

According to Soviet theorists, socialism was built in the USSR by 1936. This fact was enshrined in the 1936 Constitution of the USSR.

Testaments of Ilyich on the map of Russia

• Village, Altai Territory, Aleisky District. Index: 658110
• Village of Zavety Ilyich, Republic of Bashkortostan, Iglinsky district.
• Village of Zavety Ilyich, Krasnodar region, Kushchevsky district
• Railway platform Zaveta Ilyich, Moscow region, Pushkinsky district.
• Zavety Ilyich microdistrict of the city of Pushkino, Moscow region.
• Village, Saratov region, Engels district. Index: 413168
• Village, Sakhalin region, Nevelsky district. Postcode: 694730
• Village of Zavety Ilyich, Smolensk region, Roslavl district.
• Village of Zavety Ilyich, Khabarovsk Territory, Sovetsko-Gavansky district.

Songs

• They are faithful to Lenin's precepts. Composer Seraphim Tulikov.

Lenin’s phrase “Communism is Soviet power plus electrification of the entire country” has become a joke: “What is “electrification of the entire country”? - Communism minus Soviet power” or “Soviet power is communism minus the electrification of the entire country.”

Testaments of another Ilyich

Due to the identity of patronymics, the expression “Ilyich’s behests” is sometimes used in relation to another Ilyich - Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev. The Izvestia newspaper published an article “” dedicated to the 20th anniversary of Brezhnev’s death.

Illustrations

Write a review of the article “Ilyich’s Testaments”

Notes

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An excerpt characterizing Ilyich's Testaments

Near the village of Praca, Rostov was ordered to look for Kutuzov and the sovereign. But here not only were they not there, but there was not a single commander, but there were heterogeneous crowds of frustrated troops.
He urged his already tired horse to get through these crowds as quickly as possible, but the further he moved, the more upset the crowds became. The high road on which he drove out was crowded with carriages, carriages of all kinds, Russian and Austrian soldiers, of all branches of the military, wounded and unwounded. All this hummed and swarmed in a mixed manner to the gloomy sound of flying cannonballs from the French batteries placed on the Pratsen Heights.
- Where is the sovereign? where is Kutuzov? - Rostov asked everyone he could stop, and could not get an answer from anyone.
Finally, grabbing the soldier by the collar, he forced him to answer himself.
- Eh! Brother! Everyone has been there for a long time, they have fled ahead! - the soldier said to Rostov, laughing at something and breaking free.
Leaving this soldier, who was obviously drunk, Rostov stopped the horse of the orderly or the guard of an important person and began to question him. The orderly announced to Rostov that an hour ago the sovereign had been driven at full speed in a carriage along this very road, and that the sovereign was dangerously wounded.
“It can’t be,” said Rostov, “that’s right, someone else.”
“I saw it myself,” said the orderly with a self-confident grin. “It’s time for me to know the sovereign: it seems like how many times I’ve seen something like this in St. Petersburg.” A pale, very pale man sits in a carriage. As soon as the four blacks let loose, my fathers, he thundered past us: it’s time, it seems, to know both the royal horses and Ilya Ivanovich; It seems that the coachman does not ride with anyone else like the Tsar.
Rostov let his horse go and wanted to ride on. A wounded officer walking past turned to him.
-Who do you want? – asked the officer. - Commander-in-Chief? So he was killed by a cannonball, killed in the chest by our regiment.
“Not killed, wounded,” another officer corrected.
- Who? Kutuzov? - asked Rostov.
- Not Kutuzov, but whatever you call him - well, it’s all the same, there aren’t many alive left. Go over there, to that village, all the authorities have gathered there,” said this officer, pointing to the village of Gostieradek, and walked past.
Rostov rode at a pace, not knowing why or to whom he would go now. The Emperor is wounded, the battle is lost. It was impossible not to believe it now. Rostov drove in the direction that was shown to him and in which a tower and a church could be seen in the distance. What was his hurry? What could he now say to the sovereign or Kutuzov, even if they were alive and not wounded?
“Go this way, your honor, and here they will kill you,” the soldier shouted to him. - They'll kill you here!
- ABOUT! what are you saying? said another. -Where will he go? It's closer here.
Rostov thought about it and drove exactly in the direction where he was told that he would be killed.
“Now it doesn’t matter: if the sovereign is wounded, should I really take care of myself?” he thought. He entered the area where most of the people fleeing from Pratsen died. The French had not yet occupied this place, and the Russians, those who were alive or wounded, had long abandoned it. On the field, like heaps of good arable land, lay ten people, fifteen killed and wounded on every tithe of space. The wounded crawled down in twos and threes together, and one could hear their unpleasant, sometimes feigned, as it seemed to Rostov, screams and moans. Rostov started to trot his horse so as not to see all these suffering people, and he became scared. He feared not for his life, but for the courage that he needed and which, he knew, would not withstand the sight of these unfortunates.
The French, who stopped shooting at this field strewn with the dead and wounded, because there was no one alive on it, saw the adjutant riding along it, aimed a gun at him and threw several cannonballs. The feeling of these whistling, terrible sounds and the surrounding dead people merged for Rostov into one impression of horror and self-pity. He remembered his mother's last letter. “What would she feel,” he thought, “if she saw me now here, on this field and with guns pointed at me.”
In the village of Gostieradeke there were, although confused, but in greater order, Russian troops marching away from the battlefield. The French cannonballs could no longer reach here, and the sounds of firing seemed distant. Here everyone already saw clearly and said that the battle was lost. Whoever Rostov turned to, no one could tell him where the sovereign was, or where Kutuzov was. Some said that the rumor about the sovereign’s wound was true, others said that it was not, and explained this false rumor that had spread by the fact that, indeed, the pale and frightened Chief Marshal Count Tolstoy galloped back from the battlefield in the sovereign’s carriage, who rode out with others in the emperor’s retinue on the battlefield. One officer told Rostov that beyond the village, to the left, he saw someone from the higher authorities, and Rostov went there, no longer hoping to find anyone, but only to clear his conscience before himself. Having traveled about three miles and having passed the last Russian troops, near a vegetable garden dug in by a ditch, Rostov saw two horsemen standing opposite the ditch. One, with a white plume on his hat, seemed familiar to Rostov for some reason; another, unfamiliar rider, on a beautiful red horse (this horse seemed familiar to Rostov) rode up to the ditch, pushed the horse with his spurs and, releasing the reins, easily jumped over the ditch in the garden. Only the earth crumbled from the embankment from the horse’s hind hooves. Turning his horse sharply, he again jumped back over the ditch and respectfully addressed the rider with the white plume, apparently inviting him to do the same. The horseman, whose figure seemed familiar to Rostov and for some reason involuntarily attracted his attention, made a negative gesture with his head and hand, and by this gesture Rostov instantly recognized his lamented, adored sovereign.
“But it couldn’t be him, alone in the middle of this empty field,” thought Rostov. At this time, Alexander turned his head, and Rostov saw his favorite features so vividly etched in his memory. The Emperor was pale, his cheeks were sunken and his eyes sunken; but there was even more charm and meekness in his features. Rostov was happy, convinced that the rumor about the sovereign’s wound was unfair. He was happy that he saw him. He knew that he could, even had to, directly turn to him and convey what he was ordered to convey from Dolgorukov.
But just as a young man in love trembles and faints, not daring to say what he dreams of at night, and looks around in fear, looking for help or the possibility of delay and escape, when the desired moment has come and he stands alone with her, so Rostov now, having achieved that , what he wanted more than anything in the world, did not know how to approach the sovereign, and he was presented with thousands of reasons why it was inconvenient, indecent and impossible.
"How! I seem to be glad to take advantage of the fact that he is alone and despondent. An unknown face may seem unpleasant and difficult to him at this moment of sadness; Then what can I tell him now, when just looking at him my heart skips a beat and my mouth goes dry?” Not one of those countless speeches that he, addressing the sovereign, composed in his imagination, came to his mind now. Those speeches were mostly held under completely different conditions, they were spoken for the most part at the moment of victories and triumphs and mainly on his deathbed from his wounds, while the sovereign thanked him for his heroic deeds, and he, dying, expressed his love confirmed in fact my.
“Then why should I ask the sovereign about his orders to the right flank, when it is already 4 o’clock in the evening and the battle is lost? No, I definitely shouldn’t approach him. Shouldn't disturb his reverie. It’s better to die a thousand times than to receive a bad look from him, a bad opinion,” Rostov decided and with sadness and despair in his heart he drove away, constantly looking back at the sovereign, who was still standing in the same position of indecisiveness.
While Rostov was making these considerations and sadly driving away from the sovereign, Captain von Toll accidentally drove into the same place and, seeing the sovereign, drove straight up to him, offered him his services and helped him cross the ditch on foot. The Emperor, wanting to rest and feeling unwell, sat down under an apple tree, and Tol stopped next to him. From afar, Rostov saw with envy and remorse how von Tol spoke for a long time and passionately to the sovereign, and how the sovereign, apparently crying, closed his eyes with his hand and shook hands with Tol.
“And I could be in his place?” Rostov thought to himself and, barely holding back tears of regret for the fate of the sovereign, in complete despair he drove on, not knowing where and why he was going now.
His despair was the greater because he felt that his own weakness was the cause of his grief.
He could... not only could, but he had to drive up to the sovereign. And this was the only opportunity to show the sovereign his devotion. And he didn’t use it... “What have I done?” he thought. And he turned his horse and galloped back to the place where he had seen the emperor; but there was no one behind the ditch anymore. Only carts and carriages were driving. From one furman, Rostov learned that the Kutuzov headquarters was located nearby in the village where the convoys were going. Rostov went after them.
The guard Kutuzov walked ahead of him, leading horses in blankets. Behind the bereytor there was a cart, and behind the cart walked an old servant, in a cap, a sheepskin coat and with bowed legs.
- Titus, oh Titus! - said the bereitor.
- What? - the old man answered absentmindedly.
- Titus! Go threshing.
- Eh, fool, ugh! – the old man said, spitting angrily. Some time passed in silent movement, and the same joke was repeated again.
At five o'clock in the evening the battle was lost at all points. More than a hundred guns were already in the hands of the French.
Przhebyshevsky and his corps laid down their weapons. Other columns, having lost about half of the people, retreated in frustrated, mixed crowds.
The remnants of the troops of Lanzheron and Dokhturov, mingled, crowded around the ponds on the dams and banks near the village of Augesta.
At 6 o'clock only at the Augesta dam the hot cannonade of the French alone could still be heard, who had built numerous batteries on the descent of the Pratsen Heights and were hitting our retreating troops.
In the rearguard, Dokhturov and others, gathering battalions, fired back at the French cavalry that was pursuing ours. It was starting to get dark. On the narrow dam of Augest, on which for so many years the old miller sat peacefully in a cap with fishing rods, while his grandson, rolling up his shirt sleeves, was sorting out silver quivering fish in a watering can; on this dam, along which for so many years the Moravians drove peacefully on their twin carts loaded with wheat, in shaggy hats and blue jackets and, dusted with flour, with white carts leaving along the same dam - on this narrow dam now between wagons and cannons, under the horses and between the wheels crowded people disfigured by the fear of death, crushing each other, dying, walking over the dying and killing each other only so that, after walking a few steps, to be sure. also killed.
Every ten seconds, pumping up the air, a cannonball splashed or a grenade exploded in the middle of this dense crowd, killing and sprinkling blood on those who stood close. Dolokhov, wounded in the arm, on foot with a dozen soldiers of his company (he was already an officer) and his regimental commander, on horseback, represented the remnants of the entire regiment. Drawn by the crowd, they pressed into the entrance to the dam and, pressed on all sides, stopped because a horse in front fell under a cannon, and the crowd was pulling it out. One cannonball killed someone behind them, the other hit in front and splashed Dolokhov’s blood. The crowd moved desperately, shrank, moved a few steps and stopped again.
Walk these hundred steps, and you will probably be saved; stand for another two minutes, and everyone probably thought he was dead. Dolokhov, standing in the middle of the crowd, rushed to the edge of the dam, knocking down two soldiers, and fled onto the slippery ice that covered the pond.
“Turn,” he shouted, jumping on the ice that was cracking under him, “turn!” - he shouted at the gun. - Holds!...
The ice held it, but it bent and cracked, and it was obvious that not only under a gun or a crowd of people, but under him alone it would collapse. They looked at him and huddled close to the shore, not daring to step on the ice yet. The regiment commander, standing on horseback at the entrance, raised his hand and opened his mouth, addressing Dolokhov. Suddenly one of the cannonballs whistled so low over the crowd that everyone bent down. Something splashed into the wet water, and the general and his horse fell into a pool of blood. No one looked at the general, no one thought to raise him.
- Let's go on the ice! walked on the ice! Let's go! gate! can't you hear! Let's go! - suddenly, after the cannonball hit the general, countless voices were heard, not knowing what or why they were shouting.
One of the rear guns, which was entering the dam, turned onto the ice. Crowds of soldiers from the dam began to run to the frozen pond. The ice cracked under one of the leading soldiers and one foot went into the water; he wanted to recover and fell waist-deep.
The nearest soldiers hesitated, the gun driver stopped his horse, but shouts were still heard from behind: “Get on the ice, come on, let’s go!” let's go! And screams of horror were heard from the crowd. The soldiers surrounding the gun waved at the horses and beat them to make them turn and move. The horses set off from the shore. The ice holding the foot soldiers collapsed in a huge piece, and about forty people who were on the ice rushed forward and backward, drowning one another.
The cannonballs still whistled evenly and splashed onto the ice, into the water and, most often, into the crowd covering the dam, ponds and shore.

On Pratsenskaya Mountain, in the very place where he fell with the flagpole in his hands, Prince Andrei Bolkonsky lay, bleeding, and, without knowing it, moaned a quiet, pitiful and childish groan.
By evening he stopped moaning and became completely quiet. He didn't know how long his oblivion lasted. Suddenly he felt alive again and suffering from a burning and tearing pain in his head.
“Where is it, this high sky, which I did not know until now and saw today?” was his first thought. “And I didn’t know this suffering either,” he thought. - Yes, I didn’t know anything until now. But where am I?
He began to listen and heard the sounds of approaching horses and the sounds of voices speaking French. He opened his eyes. Above him was again the same high sky with floating clouds rising even higher, through which a blue infinity could be seen. He did not turn his head and did not see those who, judging by the sound of hooves and voices, drove up to him and stopped.
The horsemen who arrived were Napoleon, accompanied by two adjutants. Bonaparte, driving around the battlefield, gave the last orders to strengthen the batteries firing at the Augesta Dam and examined the dead and wounded remaining on the battlefield.
- De beaux hommes! [Beauties!] - said Napoleon, looking at the killed Russian grenadier, who, with his face buried in the ground and the back of his head blackened, was lying on his stomach, throwing one already numb arm far away.
– Les munitions des pieces de position sont epuisees, sire! [There are no more battery charges, Your Majesty!] - said at that time the adjutant, who arrived from the batteries that were firing at Augest.
“Faites avancer celles de la reserve, [Have it brought from the reserves,” said Napoleon, and, having driven off a few steps, he stopped over Prince Andrei, who was lying on his back with the flagpole thrown next to him (the banner had already been taken by the French, like a trophy) .
“Voila une belle mort, [This is a beautiful death,”] said Napoleon, looking at Bolkonsky.
Prince Andrei realized that this was said about him, and that Napoleon was saying this. He heard the one who said these words called sire. But he heard these words as if he heard the buzzing of a fly. Not only was he not interested in them, but he did not even notice them, and immediately forgot them. His head was burning; he felt that he was emanating blood, and he saw above him the distant, high and eternal sky. He knew that it was Napoleon - his hero, but at that moment Napoleon seemed to him such a small, insignificant person in comparison with what was now happening between his soul and this high, endless sky with clouds running across it. He didn’t care at all at that moment, no matter who stood above him, no matter what they said about him; He was only glad that people were standing over him, and he only wished that these people would help him and return him to life, which seemed so beautiful to him, because he understood it so differently now. He mustered all his strength to move and make some sound. He weakly moved his leg and produced a pitying, weak, painful groan.

Recently Anton Nosik wrote about aircraft carriers. But at one time I saw this in the windows of the house on Nikolaev Street 8, indicated in the name of the village:

These are the famous “Minsk” and “Novorossiysk”. Their fate is tragic - it repeats the path of the USSR. They went to China for scrap metal.

This all happened in the small village of Zavety Ilyich, where I lived until 1996. Now I am researching the history of this village, because before that I wrote a book where the actions take place precisely in the village of Zavety Ilyich. There's even a main character - Pasha. It's called "Six Realms". I am not providing links yet, because the book is being carefully edited. Eight pages in already... The book will offer photographs found online, maybe historical footnotes in the notes, but that's just it - ideas. For example, such a photo will definitely be in the book (APD: it won’t, the photographer is against it):

According to the book, it is in this stoker that the genies live - the servants of Shaitan, the terrible messengers of the Fiery Kingdom; possessed by the stokers, the remnants of the Blind Army. Funny, huh? Well, the book is still quite good today, I’m not ashamed of it, just as I’m not ashamed of the genre in which I’m most comfortable writing. A remarkable photo, although I didn’t take it. I left in '96...

And this is Kater! A very famous monument in the Testaments, which, alas, no longer exists:

A whole heroic story passes through the village of Zavety Ilyich. I would like to tell you, but let the current residents tell it better. My book is more about childhood memories. It is all the more interesting to me because I am not describing reality, but my vision of it. I tell the Story! I tell it always and everywhere.

It's a pity for the monument. However, in Testaments, it seems, they installed another one, from a part of a submarine with a hatch. But I won't look at the modern Testaments. They are, unfortunately, in better shape. But that's it for now. There is a unique bay there. So the village still has a future ahead of it:

With the last photo I will show you my world as I saw it in 1996. These are exactly those places, the photo covers them completely and entirely: