Eagle, I don't want to form an alliance anymore.

“Mikhail Sergeyevich, I fully support the direction of the union, but you’re moving too fast!”

Slava laid out his concerns.

Excessive price liberalization could breed rent-seeking, full profit retention could sever the relationship between the consortium and the national treasury, and autonomous production decision-making power could turn the consortium into an out-of-control local economic entity...

After listening, Gorbachev did not immediately refute, but instead asked, "What did you see at Old Zhong?"

"I have seen the results of the reform, but I have also seen the cost of the reform!"

The dual-track system did indeed stimulate the economy, but it also created large-scale rent-seeking and corruption. People with connections could get goods at the planned price and then resell them at the market price, making such huge profits that even the black market was envious. You have to understand that the corruption problem within our party is far greater than theirs!

Don't you know how much corruption is hidden in a massive, bloated bureaucratic directive economy that has been running for decades?

Old Zhong was able to withstand this cost because their economy was growing rapidly, and the resulting economic pie was large enough to cover the losses from rent-seeking. But our economy is stagnant. Introducing a dual-track system into a stagnant economy will not bring growth, but only corruption—we will tarnish the reputation of reform, not improve it!

"So what's your suggestion? Shrink back?"

"Let's move forward in a different direction. I believe that under the current system, we can introduce a price fluctuation mechanism to a small extent to increase economic vitality, but the focus of reform should not be on prices and marketization—it should be on information technology and the development of light industry."

Think about it, what do ordinary people complain about the most?

It's not some bullshit about high food prices or inflation. Under the state-mandated price, bread is so cheap it's practically free. The problem now is that there's nothing to buy in stores, so people have money but can't spend it and have to go to the black market!

Guess where the black market came from? Should I remind some high-ranking officials in certain central ministries to disclose their production quotas?

If we can increase the variety of products in light industry, improve the supply of consumer goods, and enhance the efficiency of planned resource allocation through information technology, the people's sense of gain will be far greater than that of "letting some people get rich first by deregulating prices," and it will not shake the foundation of the planned economy.

The birthmark on Gorbachev's forehead was particularly noticeable when he frowned.

Clearly, he did not entirely agree with Slava's assessment.

"Velikoslav, what you're saying about information technology and light industry sounds great, but we don't have that much time."

You said it yourself—Andropov doesn't have enough time, Chernenko doesn't have enough time either, and by the time I sit in that chair, the economic situation will only be worse, not better.

What I need are reform measures that produce quick results, measures that allow ordinary people to feel the changes within six months to a year, not an information technology blueprint that takes ten years to show results.

"I guarantee that if you reform for 500 days, the alliance will disintegrate 500 years ahead of schedule. What's the use of a fast ship? I think your ship will sink faster than it sails."

This sentence made the air between the two of them tense.

Gorbachev stared at Slava for about five seconds, during which Slava was unsure if he had gone too far.

After all, in the traditional power structure of the alliance, it takes considerable courage or considerable stupidity for a deputy director of a department to say such things to his superior, and Slava was unsure which category he belonged to.

"Our disagreement will remain in this office, you understand?"

Gorbachev's voice softened considerably as he tapped the table. "If Romanov and his gang hear this, neither of us will succeed."

“I will consider the bigger picture,” Slava acknowledged the risk, “but I would rather argue with you in your office now than wait until the consortium actually has problems and then try to clean up the mess.”

“I’ve already thought it all out. If you manage to dismantle the alliance, I’ll get Lao Zhong to raise money to make a movie about the collapse of the Soviet Union to warn future generations. You can just play yourself and be responsible for lowering the red flag from the Kremlin.”

Slava crossed his arms and spoke to Gorbachev.

Gorbachev chuckled, seemingly pleased with Slava's pragmatic attitude.

If Slava had no one backing him and was just a lone commander, he would have sent that short guy to some insignificant government office long ago. The reason Slava is talking to him like this now is simply because there are many people within the reformist faction who support Slava.

“Okay, I’ve heard your opinion,” he compromised. “I will reassess the consortium’s pricing autonomy. Perhaps 30 percent is indeed too fast, and we can go back to 20 percent. We can also add some restrictions to the autonomy in production decision-making, but the profits will remain unchanged—without giving them enough incentives, the consortium will just be an empty shell.”

Slava nodded, signaling him to continue.

"As you know, my energy is no longer focused on agriculture. Chernenko can only work for no more than three hours a day. The daily operation of the Central Secretariat, the agenda of Politburo meetings, and the coordination of foreign affairs—all these things are on my shoulders."

Romanov is constantly looking for faults in me, waiting for me to make a mistake so he can take advantage of me. I can't possibly fight him at the same time and keep a close eye on every detail of agricultural reform.

He looked at Slava and offered his chips:

"You're welcome to take the position of Secretary of Agriculture in the Secretariat of the Central Committee."

The position of Secretary of Agriculture in the Central Secretariat meant that he would be promoted from deputy director of a department to secretary of the Central Secretariat, with full authority over the formulation and implementation of Soviet agricultural policies. In the administrative hierarchy, he would no longer be Gorbachev's subordinate but his peer.

Although Gorbachev, as the Second Secretary, still ranked higher than him in the informal power hierarchy within the party.

This also meant that Gorbachev was officially handing over the agricultural domain he had cultivated for many years. In May 1984, Vladimir Karpov, an agricultural expert he had long relied on, was transferred, and his influence in the agricultural field had been weakened. It would be better to do him a favor and let Slava handle it.

In the war for supreme power with Romanov, agriculture was just a flank, and Slava was the one sent to guard that flank.

"What are the conditions?" Slava asked, after all, there's no such thing as a free lunch in a power transaction.

"The conditions are simple—you stand on my side in this battle between me and Romanov, and I want you to support me with your vote and your influence at enlarged Politburo meetings, at plenary sessions of the Central Committee, and on all occasions where voting and statements are required."

"There are some people within the reformist faction who listen to you, not me—those young cadres promoted from Uzbekistan and some border regions... I need their support."

Slava thought for a moment.

This choice wasn't actually difficult. He disagreed with the Romanov approach's emphasis on the defense industry, but he agreed with Romanov's propositions regarding industrial informatization and technological upgrading.

He had concerns about the overly rapid marketization aspects of Gorbachev's approach, but he agreed with Gorbachev's sense of direction in breaking down the rigid system.

Between two evils, choose the lesser; the alliance's economy is more important.

Moreover, at this critical juncture, if a major split occurs within the reformists—if Slava and his men openly side with Romanov or even just remain neutral—the conservatives will seize the opportunity to wipe out the reformists, and then both Gorbachev and Slava will be rendered useless.

“Okay,” he said, “but I want to make one thing clear beforehand—I will proceed according to my own judgment on the specific path of agricultural reform, and you will not interfere with the details. If I feel that a certain measure is going too fast, I will put on the brakes, and you should not accelerate it from behind.”

“Yes.” Gorbachev extended his hand.

The two shook hands.

They remain allies, at least until their common enemy is dealt with.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

Slava ran into Romanov in the corridor as he left Gorbachev's office.

The two met face to face in the middle of the corridor, so close that they could see the pattern on each other's ties.

"Comrade Ivanov," Romanov nodded in greeting, "I heard you just returned from China."

"Yes, Grigory Vasilyevich went to Beijing and several provinces and secured some big deals for the alliance."

How are the reforms going?

"There are both achievements and problems. Overall, it is worth paying attention to, but we cannot copy it."

Romanov glanced at him.

Perhaps it's because the phrase "cannot be copied" doesn't sound like something someone from Gorbachev's camp would say. In his rigid mindset, Gorbachev's confidants were radicals advocating "running towards marketization," while someone who had returned from the south and said this might at least share some common ground with him on certain issues.

"We can chat if you have time. I also have some insights into Leningrad's experience in industrial informatization, which you might find interesting."

Romanov left.

If he weren't caught up in this life-or-death political struggle between reformists and conservatives, he might have been quite willing to sit down with Romanov and seriously discuss how to combine the Leningrad model with the Amur industrial-academic consortium.

But history did not give him this luxurious option.

Chapter 43 The Dawn of Automation (8K)

When a new official takes office in the central government, the first thing he does, according to tradition, is to place his own people in his departments.

The cadre appointment system is normal.

From Khrushchev to Brezhnev to Andropov to Chernenko, the first thing each new official did upon taking office was to replace key personnel with people they trusted; the only difference lay in the extent and speed of the replacement.

Slava's approach was at least milder than his predecessors'; he didn't oust everyone left behind by his predecessors, but only transferred a few of the most key personnel:

The head of the planning department was replaced by a young cadre transferred from the Amur Commonwealth; the statistics department was replaced by an auditor who had proven his abilities during the investigation of the Uzbek cotton case; and the liaison officer responsible for liaising with the agricultural departments of the constituent republics was replaced by a "reliable person" whom the leader knew in the KGB system.

For Director Nian, "reliable" means someone who won't stab you in the back and keeps their mouth shut. As for whether this person really understands agriculture, that's secondary.

After adjusting the personnel, he began to deal with the radical changes left by Gorbachev. By the time he finished, it was already late August, and the autumn harvest was approaching on the Russian plains. The ripe wheat and soybeans exuded a dry smell mixed with soil and sunshine. From Kursk to Voronezh, combine harvesters began to rumble back and forth in the fields on the black soil.

That's the appeal of mechanized agriculture.

But Slava's attention wasn't entirely focused on the harvest. He was busy with something else—something he'd wanted to do since the day he arrived in this world, but had never found the right angle to begin with.

Information technology.

Sigrún has taught at the Iceland University of the Arts as a part-time lecturer since and was Dean of the Department of Fine Art from -. In – she held a research position at Reykjavík Art Museum focusing on the role of women in Icelandic art. She studied fine art at the Icelandic College of Arts and Crafts and at Pratt Institute, New York, and holds BA and MA degrees in art history and philosophy from the University of Iceland. Sigrún lives and works in Iceland.

OGAS, the Soviet State Automation System, is a name that always evokes a sense of melancholy in later generations.

Twenty years ago, Academician Viktor Glushkov proposed a grand vision: to establish a computer network covering the entire Soviet Union, connecting every economic unit from the State Planning Commission in the Kremlin to the most remote collective farms, using electronic computers to process massive amounts of economic data, optimize resource allocation, and eliminate delays and distortions in information transmission.

If this system could be built, the Soviet planned economy would gain something it had lacked since its inception—real and timely information.

But OGAS was rejected in the 1970s, killed by politics—bureaucrats in various ministries instinctively realized that a system that would allow the central government to see real data directly from the grassroots would completely overturn their power base as "information intermediaries"!

The Ministry of Finance and the Central Statistical Bureau colluded to sabotage Glushkov's plan. Ultimately, the Soviet Union chose a path of compromise:

Each department operates its own ACY (Automated Management System), which is incompatible with each other and operates independently. The speed at which data flows between departments is not much faster than a messenger delivering a message on horseback.

By 1984, thousands of ACY systems were installed in factories and enterprises throughout the Soviet Union. Some ran on ESEBM mainframes, while others ran on SMEBM minicomputers. The data formats varied widely, and they were basically products of the work done by technicians in various departments in the 1970s according to their own understanding and needs.

To unify these things and create a nationwide information network would be such a massive undertaking and politically resistant that any rational person would shake their head and walk away.

Slava has no plans to build a nationwide network—at least not now.

His goal was much smaller and more pragmatic: to first implement information technology within the large agricultural research and development consortium he was in charge of, connecting the data flow between seed stations, farms, processing plants, storage facilities, and transportation scheduling within the consortium, so that he could sit in his office in Moscow and see how many tons of soybeans a consortium thousands of kilometers away had harvested, dried, and loaded onto railcars that day.

Instead of waiting two or three weeks to receive a paper report that has been processed through multiple layers of paperwork.

The happiest thing in the world is this: he can truly become a player and see real data reports for a certain region at any time, instead of just whitewashing the truth.

However, the first obstacle this idea encountered was technical resistance. Computer equipment was not a problem. At that time, the Soviet Union's civilian microelectronics technology could not compare with that of the United States, but it was still usable. Factories and research institutions within the union had some ACY equipment that could be used.

But communication is a big problem.

The Soviet Union was so vast that telephone line coverage in remote collective farms was pitifully low, and data transmission was a luxury. But the association was different from ordinary collective farms—it integrated several farms and factories into a single management framework, and those factories (processing plants, oil mills, seed stations) were usually located in small towns with relatively stable power supplies and telephone lines.

As Glushkov suggested, Slava would also establish an "information node" in each state where the consortium is located, either at the consortium's management center or affiliated with the local agricultural college.

Those colleges typically have computers for teaching and research, and then data is collected from various production units to nodes, which then transmit the aggregated data to the Central Agricultural Data Center in Moscow via long-distance telephone lines or dedicated lines from the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.

"As for how the data from each production unit gets to the nodes—" Slava paused here when he was giving instructions to his subordinates, because he knew that what he was about to say would disappoint the young technical staff who were full of expectations.

"For now, we still rely on paper reports and telephone reports, which are manually entered into the terminal by the data entry staff at each node."

Sure enough, when a young engineer on loan from the Moscow Institute of Electronic Technology heard the words "manual input," his expression was as if he had just been told that his beloved ECS-1045 mainframe machine would be powered by a hand-cranked generator.

"Comrades, I know this doesn't sound advanced enough," Slava said to them, "but we tech people have to be realistic. Right now, many collective farms can't even guarantee a stable 220-volt power supply, let alone data terminals!"

Even if you transport a sophisticated electronic device to a farm office where the heating isn't even working, it will become a dusty lump of iron after three months because nobody knows how to use it or can fix it!

Let's get the middle layer sorted out first before worrying about the back end. Don't try to do too much at once.

Director Nian added, "It's like building a railway. First, build the main line, then gradually build the branch lines. As for horse-drawn carriages, I think they can run for a few more years."

...

After the proposal is submitted, it needs to go through several stages.

First, there was the Soviet Ministry of Electronics Industry, because the procurement of terminal equipment and communication interfaces required going through their channels;

Then there were the Ministry of Radio Industry and the Ministry of Communications Equipment Industry, which were responsible for coordinating the configuration of complete sets of equipment and communication lines;

There is also the Instrument Manufacturing, Automation Equipment and Control Systems Department, because they are in charge of the standard integration of the ACY system.

Understandably, departmental chaos is one of the characteristics of this highly centralized bureaucratic command-based planned economy.

It took Slava nearly three weeks just to communicate and coordinate with these ministries. Each ministry had its own budget cycle, procurement process, and technical standards, making it probably second only to getting the Soviet national football team to work together on the same project within the same timeframe.

The Ministry of Electronics Industry was the first to deliver bad news: their people said that the production schedule for end products was already booked until February of next year!

The Ministry of Radio Industry said that the complete equipment configuration needed to be approved by their internal technical review committee first. The Ministry of Communications Equipment Industry said that applications for dedicated lines in rural areas needed to go through the approval process of the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. As for the completion of the approval? Four to six months.

Let alone four or six months, it's questionable whether Chernenko can even live another six months.

When Slava was turned away for the third time by a ministry with the phrase "approval is required according to current procedures," he immediately abandoned this path and picked up his command block.

"Get me Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev."

"...Yes, I need you to speak to a few ministries for me. Just say that this project is directly supervised by the Secretariat of the Central Committee and has a higher priority than the regular production schedule..."

Yes, that must be a priority. As for other departments that need it? They can tolerate it. As long as it doesn't interfere with the Ministry of National Defense's military computers, the conservatives have no objections...

As it turned out, the Second Secretary's words were worth a thousand words from Slava. Three days later, the Ministry of Electronics Industry informed Slava that they could deliver the first batch of terminal equipment by mid-October, and the technical review by the Ministry of Radio Industry was also "expedited."

It seems that this routine delay is due to bureaucratic inertia rather than deliberate obstruction.

...

When the agricultural authorities of the constituent republics and states received the notification from the Central Secretariat regarding the "pilot construction of an information data collection system in agricultural production and research consortia," the reaction was more intense than Slava had anticipated.

He had anticipated resistance, but he hadn't expected it to come so quickly and so uniformly, as if all the local agricultural officials in the Soviet Union had held a teleconference that same night to discuss how to oppose it!