• LeninWalksTheWorld [any]
    ·
    2 years ago

    The United States was one of the leaders in science and industrial development, while the USSR was just getting around to agricultural mechanization. If Einstein wanted access to cutting edge laboratories and to mingle with other eminent scientists he would have had to go to the US. He had celebrity status in America too while at the time the USSR treated foreigners, especially scientists, with suspicion as there were worries about spies and saboteurs.

    • fifthedition [none/use name]
      ·
      2 years ago

      Were they? Spies and saboteurs? I can't imagine scientists doing shit like that. Especially believers in socialism who would immigrate to the USSR.

      • D61 [any]
        ·
        2 years ago

        I mean, if you were wanting to know what the USSR was up to, scientists working R&D are an absolute must to get flipped.

        They can feed you information about what the USSR was working on, how focused they were on the projects, and if push comes to shove, start messing with formulas and calculations (or destroying research) to slow down development.

          • D61 [any]
            ·
            2 years ago

            Don't know, I don't go into the weeds about this stuff but it seems like it would be a priority for intelligence services.

      • LeninWalksTheWorld [any]
        ·
        2 years ago

        Well.. there were probably a handful of actual spies. You might be surprised to learn that the USSR in the late 1920s/early 1930s actually had good economic ties with the United States and a lot of scientists and engineers came from companies like Ford and International Harvester to help with economic development. Not out of any sympathy for socialism, just because the companies thought it would be a good investment and they were getting paid for it. I wouldn't be surprised if a few of these guys had additional orders from the state department.

        However, the extent of the campaign and the paranoia stoked (like every workplace was expected to be vigilant, foreign engineers or not) makes it clear that the saboteur campaign's real purpose was to provide a reason for a purge of the CPSU's political enemies at the time. The NEP had only recently ended in favor of collectivization, and Stalin and the rest of the CPSU-Center wanted to get rid of any opposition to it. The anti-saboteur campaign would become the beginning of the Yezhovshchina (or the dramatically named Great Purge in English)

        • OgdenTO [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          In my gut I feel that anti-Semitism under Stalin is an anti-communist propaganda piece. However I really don't know and it's totally possible. I have heard both that anti-Semitism was illegal, but also about this anti-cosmopolitan doctrine and other things like the doctor plot.

          Does.anyone know what's real about this topic?

          • Vncredleader
            ·
            2 years ago

            The press used the Jewish names of accused intentionally, both during purges and the Doctors Plot. The latter had fuck all to do with Stalin himself, but antisemitism clearly was a thing you could do, and get away with. Making it illegal does not mean people won't do tropes or just avoid getting in trouble while being assholes.

            Though this stuff got worse in places after Stalin, particularly in Poland

  • alltherightopinions [she/her]
    ·
    2 years ago

    The United States was probably the best place to be a Jewish person in the 1930s, hell it probably still is today.