Turning the Pages of History

Abstract

The article highlights the experience of the first years of the creation of Soviet science in the conditions of revolutionary upheavals and Russian civil war. It is noted that, despite the difficult internal and international situation of Soviet Russia, in the early 1920s 33 new research institutes were already operating, including those that would become the glory of Russian science in the future - the Institute of Brain and Mental Activity, the Institute of Experimental Biology, the Institute for the Study of the North. Along with laying the foundations for Soviet science, there was an intensive formation of a new - Soviet - scientific and technical intelligentsia, which was achieved through a radical change in the structure of higher education, the classand national composition of students, training personnel for work in various sectors of the national economy, science, culture. It is with the activity of Soviet scientists that the creation of such branches of the national economy that ensured the autonomy and independence of the USSR economy from world capitalism is connected: mechanical engineering and machine tool building, aircraft building. The most direct participation of scientists was manifested in the creation of a metallurgical complex in the Urals (Magnitogorsk), the coal mining industry (Kuzbass), in the creation of automobile factories in Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod, tractorfactories in Stalingrad, Chelyabinsk, and Minsk. Thus, the Soviet experience of creating a scientific and technological sphere in the most difficult conditions of the revolutionary crisis and civil war turned out to be successful. It was precisely the understanding of the role and significance of science for solving current and especially promising tasks that became one of the foundations for the victory of the socialist transformation of the country.