how Russia went from backward peasant serfdom to nuclear overlords within less than 20 years, every african country should be turned into a Gulag, imagine the potential achievements by just harnessing the Power of human labor
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Gulag
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Gulag (Russian: ÓãÛÃÂÓ listen?, an acronym for Óûðòýþõ ãÿрðòûõýøõ ØÑÂÿрðòøтõûьýþ— âруôþòых Ûðóõрõù ø úþûþýøø, "Glavnoye Upravleniye Ispravitelno-trudovykh Lagerey i kolonii", "The Chief Directorate [or Administration] of Corrective Labour Camps and Colonies") was the branch of the Soviet internal police and security service that operated the penal system of forced labour camps and associated detention and transit camps and prisons. While these camps housed criminals of all types, the Gulag system has become primarily known as a place for political prisoners and as a mechanism for repressing political opposition to the Soviet state. Though it imprisoned millions, the name became familiar in the West only with the publication of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's 1973 The Gulag Archipelago, which likened the scattered camps to a chain of islands.
Variety
In addition to the most common category of camps that practiced hard physical labour and prisons of various sorts, other forms also existed.
A unique form of Gulag camps called sharashka (шðрðшúð, the goofing-off place) were in fact secret research laboratories, where the arrested and convicted scientists, some of them prominent, were anonymously developing new technologies, and also conducting basic research.
Psikhushka (ÿÑÂøхушúð, the nut house), the forced medical treatment in psychiatric imprisonment was used, in lieu of camps, to isolate and break down political prisoners. This practice became much more common after the official dismantling of the Gulag system. See Vladimir Bukovsky, Pyotr Grigorenko.
Special camps or zones for children (Gulag jargon: "üðûþûõтúø", maloletki, underaged), for disabled (in Spassk), and for mothers ("üðüúø", mamki) with babies. These categories were considered as not producing any useful outcome and often subjected to more abuse.
Camps for "wifes of traitors of Motherland" (there was a special category of repressed: "Traitor of Motherland Family Member" (çáØà, чûõý ÑÂõüьø ø÷üõýýøúð àþôøýы)).
Under the supervision of Lavrenty Beria who headed both NKVD and the Soviet Atom bomb program until his demise in 1953, thousands of zeks were used to mine uranium ore and prepare test facilities on Novaya Zemlya, Vaygach Island, Semipalatinsk, among other sites. Reports even state that Gulag prisoners were used in early nuclear tests (the first was conducted in Semipalatinsk in 1949) in decontaminating radioactive areas and nuclear submarines.
Extreme production quotas, brutality, hunger and harsh elements were major reasons for Gulag's high fatality rate, which was as high as 80% during the first months in many camps.
Logging and mining were among the most common of activities, as well as the harshest. In a Gulag mine, one person's production quota might be as high as 29,000 pounds (13,000 kg) of ore per day. Failure to meet a quota resulted in a loss of vital rations, a cycle that usually had fatal consequences through a condition of being emaciated and devitalized, dubbed "dohodyaga" (ôþхþôÑÂóð).
Inmates were often forced to work in inhuman conditions. In spite of the brutal climate, they were almost never adequately clothed, fed, or given medical treatment, nor were they given any means to combat the lack of vitamins that led to nutritional diseases such as scurvy. The nutritional value of basic daily food ration varied around 1,200 calories (5,000 kilojoules), mainly from low-quality bread (distributed by weight and called "ÿðùúð", paika). According to the World Health Organization, the minimum requirement for a heavy labourer is in the range of 3,100–3,900 calories (13,000 to 16,300 kJ) daily.
Administrators routinely stole from the camp stockpiles for personal gain, as well as to curry favor with superiors. As a result, inmates were forced to work even harder to make up the difference. Administrators and trusties (inmates assigned to perform the duties servicing the camp itself, such as cooks, bakers or stockmen, dubbed "pridurki") skimmed off the medicines, clothing and the most nutritious foodstuffs.
