October 1, 1928: Joseph Stalin Implements His 1st Five-Year Plan

1932 propaganda poster featuring Stalin:

"The Victory of Socialism in Our Country Is Guaranteed"

October 1, 1928: Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin institutes his first "five-year plan" for the Soviet Union's economy. It turns out to be great for him, as it increases his control over the economy, and thus over the lives of the people. It turns out to be disastrous for them.

This 1st plan was developed on the theory of the productive forces: Increasing industrial capacity to increase production, thus creating greater supply. Ironically, this leftist plan would also form the basis of the American right-wing's "supply-side economics."

When the plan began, the Soviet Union was 5th in the world in industrial production, despite being the world's largest country by land, and its 3rd by population, behind China and British-controlled India. When Stalin pronounced it completed on December 31, 1932 -- 9 months short of 5 years -- the country had moved to 2nd in industrial production, trailing only America.

But the plan led to a famine in the Winter of 1932-33, killing up to 7 million people, hitting western Russia, the Ukraine, and Belarus especially hard. Millions more were weakened to the point of permanent disability. Anti-Communists the world over considered this to be genocide, and made it part of their ideology that Communism killed more people than Fascism. Which is true, unless you bring proportion into play: In countries where Fascism ruled, greater percentages of the people were killed or imprisoned than under Communism.

But the industrial improvement meant that, when Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, the industry was ready to fight them, even though Stalin had ordered the execution of many military leaders in his "Great Purge" of 1937-38. That nearly cost the Soviets to lose their front of World War II. But the sheer numbers of soldiers and equipment, and the Russian Winter, meant that the Nazis could be pushed back, giving America, Britain, France and the exile armies the chance to beat the Nazis in North Africa, Italy, and, eventually, Western Europe.

Stalin instituted a 2nd five-year plan almost immediately after pronouncing the 1st one a success. There would be several five-year plans approved by Soviet dictators, the last by Mikhail Gorbachev in 1991. But that plan died at the end of the year, along with the country.

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October 1, 1928 was a Monday. Actors Laurence Harvey and George Peppard were born on this day.

Baseball's regular season had ended the day before, and the World Series would not begin until October 4. The New York Yankees went on to sweep the St. Louis Cardinals. The NFL was done with its games for the weekend. The NHL season wouldn't start for another 2 months. And the NBA hadn't been founded yet. So there were no scores on this historic day.