38 HUMAN LIFE IN RUSSIA
animals so heavily reduced, that the faultless working of the
tractors in particular has become a matter of the utmost
importance. Even a layman can readily understand what
it means if there are no draught animals available at sowing
time or harvest time, or even if their number is inadequate.
It may easily result in the loss of a very considerable part
of the harvest. Indeed, this is one of the chief causes of the
famine. Clearly the wastage of the complicated machines on
account of the inadequate training of the personnel must be
very great* The many vivid accounts of the gigantic machine
cemeteries are not really necessary as corroborative evidence.
This makes the problem of spare parts and repairs all the more
important.
The tractor troubles are very freely reported in the Soviet
press. It is often sufficient to look at the headlines of the big
Moscow papers, e.g. one in Pravda which runs: "Bureaucrats
and thieves at work in the tractors factory." Izvestia (February
23,1934) reports from Leningrad that the local works have not
completed half the tractors intended. On February 24 the
same paper had a report from its Tashkent correspondent to
the effect that defective tractor parts were being despatched to
that region by the thousand. "Part of the fault/' he writes, "is
due to the tractor centres, which pass large parcels of defective •
reserve parts without noticing it. The result is chaos, and the
entire repairs time-table is upset." On February 19 Pravda
summed up its views on the collapse (froval') of the tractor-
repair plan by quoting an extract from the Leningrad paper
Put Linina (Lenin's Way). "The chief reason for the collapse of
the repair plan," the paper said, "is the scandalous organization
of the work. But a number of monstrous occurrences have also
contributed to the breakdown of the repair campaign, the non-
fulfilment of the plan, and these have been permitted by idiots
in charge of the motor and tractor stations."
Recent developments with regard to agricultural machinery
are apparent from a decree issued by the Central Committee of