Western Participation in Soviet Development, 1959–79

Abstract

The Soviet Union has purchased some $40 billion worth of machinery and equipment from the industrialised West, since its first major imports in 1959.¹ According to the recent official declaration of a Soviet expert, the USSR’s hard currency indebtedness amounts to $20 billion. To meet its short-term payments needs, the Soviet Union has sold some 5000 tons of gold on the world market — or twice the reserves of the Bank of France. Though these amounts may seem modest on a world scale, they nevertheless reflect operations of considerable economic significance. Between 1973–78 alone, Soviet capital goods imports from the West were comparable to annual equipment investments in France, double the annual Italian level.²