Исследовательская работа Сотрудничество между союзниками и СССР во время ВОВ

Муниципальное бюджетное общеобразовательное учреждение

лицей № 4 г.Данков Липецкой области

Лицейское научное общество « Синяя птица»

Конкурс исследовательских работ « Первые шаги в науку»

Секция: Языкознание

"Cooperation between Allies and USSR during WWII"

Выполнил
Михеев Даниил
9 б класс

Руководитель
Черных Н.И.,
учитель английского языка.

Данков
2014г.

Contents.

Introduction………………………………………..2

Chapter I. The history of the cooperation between Allies and the USSR during the WWII..................................................................3-5
Chapter II. Results of Lend-Lease…………….6-9

Chapter III. Did the Lend-Lease help us?...........9

Conclusion……………………………………..10

The list of sources……………………………...11

Introduction.

The Great Patriotic War startedon June 22, 1941. And the Soviet Union was receiving support from the USA and Britain since the war had begun. The first English convoy went to Arkhangelsk during the Operation «Dervish». It was August 12, 1941. The convoy included six dry cargo ships ("Alchiba", "Lancastrian", "Lanstephan Castle", "New Westminster City", "Trehata", "Eshen") and one auxiliary tanker ("Aldersdale"). Those ships transported strategic goods and was named the PQ-0. So the program of the Lend-Lease (Cooperation between USSR and Allies) was opened.

In our project we will examine a history of the Lend-Lease and show results of this program. Also, we will to ask the question "did the Lend-Lease really help us?".

The hypothesis of our project is: "We could win the War without Lend-Lease". The object of study is interaction between the USSR and Allies in 1941-1945. The thing of study is information about Arctic Convoys, another ways to transfer military equipment and the price the USSR paid for the Lend-Lease. The research methods are analysis of the sources and generalization of research results.

Chapter I.

The history of the cooperation between Allies and USSR during WWII.

An Act to Promote the Defense of the United States was passed on March 11, 1941. It was the first step towards cooperation with countries that have already entered into the War against Germany.

This was nine months before the U.S. entered the war in December 1941. Formally titled An Act to Further Promote the Defense of the United States, the Act effectively ended the United States' pretense of neutrality.

A total of $50.1 billion (equivalent to $650 billion today) worth of supplies were shipped. That represented 17% of the total war expenditures of the U.S. In all, $31.4 billion went to Britain, $11.3 billion to the Soviet Union, $3.2 billion to France, $1.6 billion to China, and smaller sums to other Allies. Reverse Lend-Lease comprised services such as rent on air bases that went to the U.S., and totaled $7.8 billion; of this, $6.8 billion came from the British and the Commonwealth. The terms of the agreement provided that the material was to be used until time for their return or destruction. In practice very little equipment was returned. Supplies that arrived after the termination date were sold to Britain at a large discount for £1.075 billion using long-term loans from the United States. Canada operated a similar program called Mutual Aid that sent a loan of $1 billion and $3.4 billion in supplies and services to Britain and other Allies. The United States did not charge for aid supplied under this legislation.

Lend-Lease provided supply food, equipment, planes, tanks and other military systems. Most of them were transported by sea. Special sea convoys, named "Arctic convoys" were coming in north Soviet ports in 1941-1945. Those convoys usually had war ships and sometimes had air support. It was an escort of the convoys. Their path run across Arctic Sea. There were a lot of Soviet, American and English sailors on those ships.

Arctic convoys often take fight against German submarines, ships and Air Force in the Ocean. 85 merchant ships and 16 warships only of the Navy of Great Britain (2 cruisers, 6 destroyers and other escort vessels 8) were lost in battles. Thousands people were killed. One of the famous episodes of actions in Arctic Sea was the situation with the German destroyer "Tirpitz", which was in Norway and controlled all sea ways of North. In November 1944 "Tirpitz" was sunk. So the most famous convoy was the PQ-17, which was sunk by German Navy in 1942.

The Arctic route was the shortest and most direct route for lend-lease aid to the USSR, though it was also the most dangerous. Some 3,964,000 tons of goods were shipped by the Arctic route; 7% was lost, while 93% arrived safely. This constituted some 23% of the total aid to the USSR during the war.

The Persian Corridor was the longest route, and was not fully operational until mid-1942. Also, a lot of U.S.-planes were forwarded trough Alaska. Our pilots ferried aircraft to the USSR in poor weather conditions and lost 114 people since 1942. It was one of the air way of the Lend-Lease.

US deliveries to USSR

American deliveries to the Soviet Union can be divided into the following phases:

• "pre Lend-lease" 22 June 1941 to 30 September 1941 (paid for in gold and other minerals)

• first protocol period from 1 October 1941 to 30 June 1942 (signed 1 October 1941), these supplies were to be manufactured and delivered by the UK with US credit financing.

• second protocol period from 1 July 1942 to 30 June 1943 (signed 6 October 1942)

• third protocol period from 1 July 1943 to 30 June 1944 (signed 19 October 1943)

• fourth protocol period from 1 July 1944, (signed 17 April 1945), formally ended 12 May 1945 but deliveries continued for the duration of the war with Japan (which the Soviet Union entered on the 8 August 1945) under the "Milepost" agreement until 2 September 1945 when Japan capitulated. On 20 September 1945 all Lend-Lease to the Soviet Union was terminated.

British deliveries to the USSR

In June 1941 within weeks of the German invasion of the USSR the first British aid convoy set off along the dangerous Arctic sea routes to Murmansk arriving in September. It was carrying 40 Hawker Hurricanes along with 550 mechanics and pilots of No. 151 Wing to provide immediate air defence of the port and train Soviet pilots. After escorting Soviet bombers and scoring 14 kills for one loss, and completing the training of pilots and mechanics, No 151 Wing left in November their mission complete. The convoy was the first of many convoys to Murmansk and Archangelsk in what became known as the Arctic convoys. Between June 1941 and May 1945 3,000 Hurricanes were delivered to the USSR along with 4,000 other aircraft, 5,000 tanks, 5,000 anti-tank guns and 15 million boots in total 4 million tons of war materials including food and medical supplies were delivered. The returning ships carried the gold that the USSR was using to pay the US.

Significant numbers of British Churchill and Matilda tanks along with US M3 Lee were shipped to the USSR after becoming obsolete on the African Front. The Churchills, supplied by the arctic convoys, saw action around Leningrad while tanks shipped by the Persian route supplied the Caucasian Front. With the USSR giving priority to the defence of Moscow for domestically produced tanks this resulted in 40% of tanks in service on the Caucasian Front being Lend-Lease models.

Сhapter II.

Results of Lend-Lease.

Of course, Len-Lease had very well results. It was the biggest economic program of the WWII. Let's look at the information about total number of the sent cargoes. Also, it is necessary to say that the USSR established independently range of supplies.

Immediately after the war, the U.S. sent to countries that have received assistance under the lend-lease, a proposal to return to the surviving military equipment and pay the debt for obtaining new loans. Since the law of the land-lease provided for the write-off used in military equipment and materials, the Americans insisted on paying for only civil supplies: railway transport, power plants, ships, trucks and other equipment, which was in the recipient countries as of September 2, 1945. For the military equipment, which was destroyed by the fascists during the fighting, the United States did not ask a penny.

This is perhaps the main topic for speculation of people trying to somehow discredit the Lend-Lease program. Most of them consider it their indispensable duty to declare that the USSR was supposedly paid for all supplies under the Lend-Lease cargo. Of course, this is nothing more than a delusion (or a conscious lie.) Neither the Soviet Union nor any other country receiving assistance under the Lend-Lease, in accordance with the law the Lend-Lease during the war for this assistance did not pay, so to speak, not a cent. Moreover, as already stated in the beginning, they did not have to pay, and after the War of the materials, equipment, arms and ammunition, which were spent in the war. You had to pay only for what remained after the war intact and could be used by recipient country. Thus, any payments of lend-lease during the war was not. Another thing is that the Soviet Union did send a variety of goods in the United States (including 320 tons of chrome ore, 32 million tons of manganese ore as well as gold, platinum, wood). This was done within the framework of reverse lend-lease. In addition, the same program was part of a free repair of American vessels in Russian ports and other services. Unfortunately, I could not find, on which the total amount of the Allies was provided goods and services under reverse lend-lease. The only one I have found a source claims that this is the sum of 2.2 million dollars. But personally, I'm not sure of the authenticity of the data. Nevertheless, they can be considered as a lower limit. The upper limit in this case will be the sum of several hundred million dollars. Be that as it may, the proportion of reverse Lend-Lease in total lend-lease trade between the USSR and the Allies will not exceed 3-4%. For comparison, the amount of reverse lend-lease from the UK to the United States equals $ 6.8 billion, representing 18.3% of total trade in goods and services between the two countries.

So, no payment of lend-lease during the war did not happen. Americans account provided by recipient country only after the war. Outstanding debt of Great Britain to the United States totaled $ 4.33 billion, to Canada - $ 1.19 billion last payment of $ 83.25 million (for the U.S.) and $ 22.7 million (Canadian) was held December 29, 2006. The volume of debt in China was identified $ 180 million, and this debt has not yet been repaid. The French paid the United States May 28, 1946, giving the U.S. a number of trade preferences.

Debt of the USSR was defined in 1947 in the amount of $ 2.6 billion, but in 1948 this figure was reduced to 1.3 billion, however, the Soviet Union refused to pay. The ban was in response to new concessions to the U.S.: in 1951, the amount of debt has been revised again and this time amounted to 800 million agreement on the procedure for repayment of debt to pay for the Lend-Lease between the USSR and the USA was signed on 18 October 1972 (the amount of debt was again reduced, this time to 722 million dollars, maturity - 2001), the Soviet Union went to this agreement only if a loan him the Export-Import Bank. In 1973, the Soviet Union has made two payments totaling $ 48 million, but then stopped payments in connection with the enactment of the 1974 Jackson-Vanik amendment to the Soviet-American Trade Agreement of 1972. In June 1990, during the negotiations between U.S. and USSR, the parties returned to the discussion of the debt. Set a new calculation of the final repayment of debt - in 2030, and the sum - 674 million dollars.

To conclude, I'd like to say that during the Great Patriotic War the USSR was sending ships with cargo of gold to the USA. And this fact is the occasion for discussion nowadays.

Chapter III.

Did the Lend-Lease help us?

Lend-Lease would help the British and Allied forces win the battles of future years; the help it gave in the battles of 1941 was trivial. In 1943-1944, about a quarter of all British munitions came through Lend-Lease. Aircraft (in particular transport aircraft) comprised about a quarter of the shipments to Britain, followed by food, land vehicles and ships.

Even after the United States forces in Europe and the Pacific began to reach full strength in 1943-1944, Lend-Lease continued. Most remaining allies were largely self-sufficient in front line equipment (such as tanks and fighter aircraft) by this stage, but Lend-Lease provided a useful supplement in this category even so, and Lend-Lease logistical supplies (including motor vehicles and railroad equipment) were of enormous assistance.

Much of the aid can be better understood when considering the economic distortions caused by the war. Most belligerent powers cut back severely on production of non-essentials, concentrating on producing weapons. This inevitably produced shortages of related products needed by the military or as part of the military-industrial complex.

The USSR was highly dependent on rail transportation, but the war practically shut down rail equipment production: only about 92 locomotives were produced. 2,000 locomotives and 11,000 railcars were supplied under Lend-Lease. Likewise, the Soviet air force received 18,700 aircraft, which amounted to about 14% of Soviet aircraft production (19% for military aircraft).

Although most Red Army tank units were equipped with Soviet-built tanks, their logistical support was provided by hundreds of thousands of U.S.-made trucks. Indeed by 1945 nearly two-thirds of the truck strength of the Red Army was U.S.-built. Trucks such as the Dodge 3/4 ton and Studebaker 2½ ton, were easily the best trucks available in their class on either side on the Eastern Front. American shipments of telephone cable, aluminium, canned rations, and clothing were also critical.

I think, we could win the Great Patriotic War without Lend-Lease. So a lot of people say that we could win this war without the Second Front. But at what cost?

There's no doubt, using Lend-Lease we managed to save many lives of our soldiers. However, we cannot think that we won only thanks to Lend-Lease.

Conclusion.

So, we are convinced that lend-lease was the biggest program of interaction between the USSR and the Allies during the Second World War. Implementation of this program has cost many lives, allies and our soldiers and officers. Although the consequences of the lend-lease can be considered very ambiguous, it is the lend-lease was an example of fraternal aid and military cooperation between the countries-Allies. In addition, this historical phenomenon cannot be forgotten. Too high price paid for it.

In our project we managed to consider the main aspects of the lend-lease program, and analyze data on the supply of the lend-lease program during the Second World war and confirm the hypothesis that we could win a war without lend-lease, although he helped us.

Literature

1. lend-lease.ru/

2. statehistory.ru/35/Lend-liz--Mify-i-realnost/

3. nvo.ng.ru/history/2001-10-12/5_land_lize.html

4. Бутенина Н. В. Ленд-лиз: сделка века. - М.: ГУ ВШЭ, 2004.

5. Стеттиниус Э. Загадки ленд-лиза. Ленд-лиз - оружие победы, Издательство «Вече», 2000.