Grozny Oil Institute Students, Professors Solving Defense And Economic Problems During War

Abstract

On June 22, 1941 the Great Patriotic War began. The call of the party and the government did not leave the Soviet people indifferent. The whole country stood up to defend its Fatherland from fascism. Higher educational institutions of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ChIASSR) – the Chechen-Ingush State Pedagogical Teacher Training Institute and the Grozny Petroleum Institute– made their modest contribution to the approaching of the Victory. These were relatively young universities: the State Oil Inspectorate was opened in 1929, ChiGPI – in 1938. Students, teachers, employees of Grozny Oil Institute took an active part in solving political, educational, economic and defense problems during the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945. Due to the beginning of the war the educational, research and educational work of the institute's faculty was completely rebuilt. The terms of training and research plans were revised. Students of the Oil Institute were mostly used at the enterprises of oil industry. Short evacuation of the Institute staff in autumn 1942 to the city of Kokand of the Uzbek SSR interrupted the work of the Institute. However, in April 1943, the Institute was returned to Grozny and continued to carry out economic, defense tasks of the party and the government, participating in agricultural and labor activities. Grozny Oil Institute's contribution to the Victory was appreciated: by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of November 27, 1945, Grozny Oil Institute was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor.

Keywords: StudentsteacherswarGrozny Oil Institute

Introduction

On June 22, 1941 the peaceful life of the Soviet people was interrupted by the Great Patriotic War. Nazi Germany planned to defeat the Soviet army with a lightning stroke and seize the territory up to the Urals.

At the call of the party and the government, all the peoples of our country stood up for the defense of the homeland, to fight against Nazi Germany. General mobilization was announced in the country. No one could remain indifferent to the call to defend the homeland. The country turned into a single combat camp, covered by the main task – to defeat the enemy, to expel him from his native land, to destroy fascism.

Educational institutions of various levels, including higher education institutions, made their contribution to the victory. The tasks of higher education institutions become more complicated during the war. In military conditions, their role as centers of political and educational work is also growing. Along with the training of specialists, the solution of military-political, defensive and economic tasks becomes one of the main ones.

Despite all the hardships of the war period, the higher educational institutions worked with even greater efficiency than in peacetime conditions. The evidence of their selfless service to the Motherland is their fruitful activity.

Educational work in higher education institutions was radically reorganized in connection with the war. In accordance with the military requirements, the terms of education were shortened, the universities worked according to the transitional curricula, and the period of summer holidays was also shortened. Amendments and additions were made to the curricula to improve the training of specialists. In the first post-war academic year there were difficulties with the timely start of classes due to the mobilization of students for agricultural work. During the whole academic year the practice of involving students in various economic and defensive activities was used, and in many technical universities the students combined their studies with work. The evacuation of higher education institutions located in the zone of enemy occupation or in the areas close to the front caused their studies to start several months late. The relocation of higher education institutions, pedagogical and student staff, and equipment required a great deal of effort.

Problem Statement

Participation of students, teachers and employees of the Grozny Oil Institute in solving political, educational, economic and defense problems during the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 is one of the insufficiently studied problems in the national historiography. Despite the fact that over the past decades the researchers have published a number of works on the history of GNI, unfortunately, there are still no generalized works on the subject of research.

Today the researchers face the task to generalize the information about the participation of students, teachers, employees of the State National Research Institute in the Great Patriotic War. The contribution of teachers, employees, students and graduates of GNI in the Great Patriotic War, in our opinion, should be studied more deeply. The reconstruction of the true picture of heroism is a tribute to the memory of the millions of victims of the war.

Over the past decades, a significant number of works have been published that analyze the activities of the entire higher education system and individual universities during the Great Patriotic War – Garkin and Shirokov (2008), Jafarov and Jafarov (2003), Jafarov and Kurumov (2010).

However, the contribution of GNI representatives to the victory in the Great Patriotic War did not become the subject of special research, which determines the relevance of the study. Some aspects of the problem were considered in the monograph of Abazatov (1973), in jubilee editions (GGOTU, 1979), in researches by Matagova (2009, 2013), Zakhiraeva (2003). A lot of material on the studied problem is kept in the fonds of the State Archive of the Russian Federation (GA RF, 2003).

Research Questions

The subject of the study is the contribution of representatives of the Grozny Oil Institute to the victory in the Great Patriotic War.

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to study the participation of students, teachers and employees of the Grozny Oil Institute in solving political, educational, economic and defense problems during the Great Patriotic War of 1941–1945.

Research Methods

The methodological basis was the principles of objectivity, science and historicism, which imply the study of facts and phenomena in all their diversity, in the specific historical conditions of their emergence and development, and allow to highlight both positive and negative sides of the analyzed events and phenomena. The authors applied methods of source analysis.

Findings

Higher educational institutions of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ChIASSR) passed the wartime trials with honor. By the beginning of the war, two higher educational institutions were functioning in the republic: the Chechen-Ingush State Pedagogical Teacher Training Institute (CIGPI) and the Grozny Petroleum Institute (GNI). Their activity was also subordinated to strengthening the defense power of the state. During the first days of the war, an order was issued for mobilization into the ranks of the Red Army. Many students of the Grozny Oil Institute in the first days of the war were enrolled as cadets in the Grozny Infantry School and after 4 months of training they entered the disposal of 242 mining and rifle division. Throughout all subsequent war years students, teachers and employees of CIGPI and SNI were drafted into the Soviet army. Despite the fact that many students of these universities were mobilized in the army, classes in educational institutions were not interrupted. Graduates from the State National Research Institute were not interrupted even in the 1942–1943 academic year, when the institute was in evacuation.

The wartime conditions demanded from the students, professors and teachers of the Petroleum Institute a radical restructuring of all their work. Changes were made to the definition of the terms of training of highly qualified personnel. The beginning of the war created the need to train specialists in higher and secondary educational institutions in the shortened terms of education. New, shortened terms of education were introduced for higher education institutions. At the Oil Institute it was reduced from 5 to 3.5 years. The reduction of the term of training was made at the expense of compaction of the working day at preservation of the same program. The number of academic hours increased daily by one hour, and the summer and winter holidays of students were reduced by half (Abazatov, 1973).

Since the beginning of the war, the work of the Institute has been focused on solving urgent military, defence and economic problems. The subjects of research work of some departments of the Institute were changed in accordance with the set tasks. The research plan approved in early 1941 was changed in August 1941. The subjects of scientific-research works were revised in connection with the wartime, and the new plan of these works was approved by the head of the State University of Oil Commissariat Aliyev in August 1941. (State Administration of the Russian Federation). This is evidenced by the report on the implementation of the plan of research work on the Grozny Oil Institute for 1941, submitted to the HQHS on May 13, 1942. In connection with this revision, some of the topics were removed from the plan and additional topics were included. The topics of research work were changed in all departments. According to the course of military and physical training, the research work was replaced by methodological and defense work (State Administration of the Russian Federation).

Changes occurred in the training programs. Special military and sanitary disciplines were introduced into the number of studied disciplines, changes were made in the teaching of old disciplines in accordance with the requirements of the People's Commissariat of Defense. Thus, students of the Grozny Oil Institute had their medical practice twice a week in the hospital placed at school No. 2 (GGOTU, 1979).

From the very beginning of the war the faculty and students of the State National Institute of Oil and Gas has been carrying out economic, defense tasks of the party and the government, taking part in agricultural harvesting works, as well as in labor works. Training session at the Institute in 1941 was stopped for three months due to the participation of students and faculty in agricultural and defense works (GARF). At the end of November 1941, the Institute was mobilized for the construction of defensive lines in the area of Goryachevodsk (GGOTU, 1979).

The decree of the Council of People's Commissars of the ChIASSR and the bureau of the regional committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks (b) "About the introduction of education in agricultural work of students" prescribes the introduction of education in agricultural work of students of all secondary schools of the senior classes (8, 9 and 10 classes), in technical schools, medical schools and other secondary schools, in higher educational institutions.

On the initiative of Sorkin, a member of the party organization of the GNI, students and teachers were used in various labor activities during the holidays. Some students were sent to protect production facilities, others – to state farms for harvesting; teachers worked in the fields and factories.

It should be noted that the students of the Oil Institute were more often used at the enterprises of the oil industry. Thus, the newspaper "Groznensky Rabochiy" in July 1941 reported on the participation of more than 300 students of the Groznensky Oil Institute during the summer holidays at the enterprises of the oil industry. Students of the second year worked as chemists, draftsmen; students of the third year – in the office of Grozneftezvedka, in the design and estimate office, in the trusts of Gorskneft, Starogrozneft; Students of the fourth year – duty engineers, drillers, assistant drillers – were sent to the enterprises of the oil industry of the USSR as field engineers and engineers – technologists. Thus, the students of the Grozny Oil Institute replenished the labor resources of enterprises and institutions with their selfless work for the front, for the victory of the country.

Students of the Grozny Oil Institute actively worked at the Grozny plant "Krasny molot", where tanks were repaired and Molotov cocktails, mines and grenades were produced.

In the summer of 1942, due to the approaching front, the Institute began to prepare for evacuation. In the autumn of 1942, the staff of the Institute was evacuated to the city of Kokand of the Uzbek SSR (GGOTU, 1979). All material valuables, educational literature, archival materials and other documents of the educational institution were taken away. In connection with the evacuation to the east, the information on the Grozny Oil Institute about the participation in labor works is absent in the report of the Main Directorate of Educational Institutions (GUUZ'a) of the People's Commissariat of Oil, presented on October 3, 1942 (GA RF). The life of the institute in evacuation was short and in April 1943 the order to return the institute to Grozny arrived, and on May 17, 1943 the classes were resumed in Grozny (GGOTU, 1979). After the return of the State Oil Inspectorate, he continued to carry out economic and defense tasks of the party and the government, participating in agricultural and labor activities.

Conclusion

The conducted research allows to assert that Grozny Oil Institute made a worthy contribution to the solution of educational, economic and defense tasks during the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945.

Grozny Oil Institute's contribution to the Victory was appreciated: by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of November 27, 1945 Grozny Oil Institute was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labor for successful training of personnel for the oil industry.

References

• Abazatov, M. A. (1973). Chechen-Ingush ASSR in the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union. AST Press.
• GA RF (2003). State Archives of the Russian Federation. Moscow.
• Garkin, V. P., & Shirokov, G. A. (2008). The Patriotic War and Higher School, 1941-1945. GHT Publ.
• GGOTU (1979). 50 years of the Grozny Order of the Red Banner of Labor to the M.D. Millionshchikov Oil Institute.Chechen-Ingush Book Publ. House.
• Jafarov, K. I., & Jafarov, A. K. (2003). 110 Years of Grozny Oil Industry: Pages of History. Oil industry, 9, 121–127.
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• Matagova, H. A. (2013). Grozny Oil Institute during the Great Patriotic War Russia and the Caucasus: History and Modernity. In Proc. of the All-Russ. Sci. and Pract. Conf. dedicated to the 1150th anniversary of the Russ. statehood (pp. 561–569). Grozny.
• Matagova, K. A. (2009). Formation and development of higher education in Chechnya in 1920–1944 (Doctoral Dissertation). Grozny.
• Zakhiraeva, Z. A. (2003). From the history of formation of Grozny Oil Institute. In Proc. of All-Russ. Sci. and Pract. Conf. “Science, Education and Production”. Grozny.