Lend-Lease WW2 – American Supply to the Allies

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Lend-Lease History In the Second World War

Lend Lease Definition:

Lend-lease  – a state act of the United States of America (USA), which allowed in 1941-1945 to supply their allies in World War II with military supplies, equipment, food, medical equipment and medicines, strategic raw materials, including petroleum products without pre-payment. All Lend-Lease deliveries were paid for by the US Treasury, the return of the remaining serviceable weapons and equipment should be made after the end of hostilities (in fact, the defeat of Japan). The main recipients of supplies under the Lend-Lease Act were the countries of the British Commonwealth of Nations and the USSR.
The Lend-Lease Act gave the President of the United States the power to help any country whose defense was deemed vital to his country, without payment in advance. The Lend Lease Act (Lend Lease Act) full name – “Law to ensure the defense of the United States” (An Act to Promote the Defense of the United States), adopted by the US Congress on March 11, 1941, provided the following conditions:

• property transferred under lend-lease, remaining after the end of the war and suitable for civilian purposes, will be paid in whole or in part on the basis of long-term loans provided by the United States (mostly interest-free loans);
• If the American side is interested, the undestroyed and unlost machinery and equipment must be returned to the United States after the war.

In the post-war period, various assessments of the role of Lend-Lease were expressed. In the historiography of the USSR, the significance of the supplies was diminished, while the allies often exaggerated them. Deliveries in the period from 1941 to 1942 were most important for supporting the defense capability of the USSR.

 

Table of Contents

• International Lend-Lease Agreements (1941-1945)
• Supply volumes and the significance of lend-lease
  
• Deliveries to the USSR
  • Deliveries from the USA
  • Routes and volume of deliveries
    • Cargo supplied by the Allies to the Soviet Union from Great Britain
    • Cargo supplied to the Soviet Union from the USA by years
  • Nomenclature and value of supplies
• Lend-Lease debts and their payment
• Lend-Lease. Estimates and opinions of state and military figures, politicians, historians, publicists
• Scope of Supply

 

 

International WW2 Lend-Lease Agreements

Initially, the act of lend-lease was extended to the countries of the British Empire and China. From November 1941, its action was extended to the USSR, and by the end of the war, almost all US allies became recipients of lend-lease assistance.

In 1942 the United States signed another agreement with Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Free France, the so-called reverse lend-lease. According to him, the allies have already provided the US Army with goods, services and transport services, their military bases. For 90% (in value terms), reverse lend-lease was provided by Great Britain together with its colonies: these were both high-tech military products and maintenance and supply (including medicines) of American bases in the British Isles. Australia and New Zealand provided US bases in the South Pacific with agricultural products. The USSR supplied 300 thousand tons of chromium and thousand tons of manganese ores, and large reserves of platinum, gold, wood, and other materials that the US badly needed.

Under the lend-lease program, 17,500 thousand tons of finished products, machine tools, semi-finished products, food and gasoline were delivered to the USSR, costing the US Treasury $11.3 billion. Taking into account the assistance of the USSR from Great Britain and Canada, this amount reaches 13 billion dollars. At the rate of 2015, this is more than 160 billion dollars. The composition of the deliveries was approved in agreement with the Soviet side.

The governments of the USSR and the USA signed an “Agreement on Principles Applicable to Mutual Assistance in the Waging of War against Aggression”, declaring the intentions of the parties. According to this agreement, the USSR had the right to receive materials, resources and information on the basis of the American lend-lease law.

The lend-lease program began to curtail after the surrender of Germany and in August 1945, after the surrender of Japan, was completely terminated. It was an important factor in victory: supplies were extremely important at the initial stage of the war (when enterprises were evacuated to the east and launched); one of the important entry points was Murmansk (22.6% of supplies), and the Kola Peninsula was cut off by the blockade of Leningrad. However, the main part (47.1%) came through the Pacific Ocean, was transported on Soviet ships to Vladivostok past Japan, which was neutral to the USSR. Through the USSR-occupied Iran from India (23.8% of the supply). In order for the USSR to transport goods under its own flag, the United States gave it 596 ships and vessels.

Since, according to the Lend-Lease Act, the supply of industrial equipment remaining in the USSR must be paid for, the United States tried to obtain this amount, equal to 2.7 billion dollars. Soviet-American negotiations in 1948-1949 were fruitless, since the USSR was categorically opposed to this amount. In 1951, the US government twice reduced the debt to $800 million. As a result, another agreement on the payment of debts for Lend-Lease deliveries was signed in 1972. The USSR pledged to pay $722 million, including interest, by 2001. In 1973, a payment of $48 million was made, and then debt payments were suspended after the United States began to apply discriminatory trade measures against the USSR (the Jackson-Vanik amendment).

 

In 1990, they set a new maturity date for the Lend-Lease debt in the amount of $674 million – until 2030. After the collapse of the USSR, the Russian Federation in April took upon itself the payment of all Soviet debts, including lend-lease obligations to the United States. The Soviet debt for Lend-Lease supplies was finally paid and closed as part of the settlements with the Paris Club on August 21, 2006.

Supply volumes and the significance of lend-lease

Materials totalling $. billion (about $ billion in prices ) were sent to several dozen recipient countries, including the main ones:

Beneficiary / Assistance in dollars in prices:	1941-1945, billion	1990, billion	2008, billion
Great Britain	31.4	233.18	384.12
USSR	11.3	83.92	138.25
France	3.2	23.76	39.15
Republic of China	1.6	11.88	19.57

Post-war lend-lease payments (for example, the lease of air bases) received by the United States amounted to $ 7.8 billion, of which $ 6.8 billion came from the UK and the British Commonwealth and $ 0.7 billion from the USSR. At the same time, the counter lend-lease from the USSR to the USA amounted to only 2.2 million dollars.

Canada also had a lend-lease program similar to the US, under which deliveries amounted to $ 4.7 billion, mainly to the UK and the USSR.

The advantage in GDP of the anti-Hitler coalition over the Axis countries is illustrated by the following table, which shows the GDP of the main countries participating in World War II, from 1938 to 1945, in billions of international dollars in 1990 prices.

 

Graph of the ratio of the GDP of the anti-Hitler coalition and the countries of the “axis” during -.

Country/Year	1938	1939	1940	1941	1942	1943	1944	1945
Axis countries
Austria	24	27	27	29	27	28	29	12
Germany	351	384	387	412	417	426	437	310
Italy	141	151	147	144	145	137	117	–
France	–	–	–	130	116	110	93	–
Japan	169	184	192	196	197	194	189	144
Axis countries total:	685	746	753	911	902	895	826	466
Countries of the anti-Hitler coalition
USSR	359	366	417	359	274	305	362	343
France	186	199	164	–	–	–	–	101
Great Britain	284	287	316	344	353	361	346	331
USA	800	869	943	1094	1235	1399	1499	1474
Anti-Hitler coalition total:	1629	1600	1840	1797	1862	2065	2363	2341
GDP Ratio, Allies/Axis:	2.38	2.14	2.44	1.97	2.06	2.31	2.86	5.02

 

By December 1941, the total GDP of the USSR and Great Britain was compared to the GDP of Germany and its European allies as 1:1. This is due to the fact that by this time Great Britain was exhausted by the naval blockade and could not help the USSR in any significant way in the short term. Moreover, according to the results of 1941, Great Britain was losing the battle for the Atlantic, which was fraught with a complete collapse for the country’s economy, which was almost entirely dependent on foreign trade, and a real threat of its occupation planned by Hitler.

The GDP of the USSR in 1942, in turn, due to the occupation of large territories by Germany, decreased by more than a third compared to the pre-war level, while out of almost 200 million people, about 78 million people and the main industrial centers remained in the occupied territories, as well as under blockade and at the front line.

Thus, in 1942, the USSR and Great Britain were inferior to Germany and its satellites both in terms of GDP (0.9: 1) and in terms of population (taking into account the losses of the USSR due to the occupation). In this situation, the US leadership saw the need to provide urgent military-technical assistance to both countries. Moreover, the United States was the only country in the world with sufficient production capacity to provide such support in a short enough time to influence the course of hostilities in 1942. Throughout 1941, the United States continued to increase its military assistance to Great Britain, and on October 1,1941, Roosevelt approved the connection of the USSR to Lend-Lease.

Lend-Lease, coupled with increasing British aid in its Battle of the Atlantic, proved to be a critical factor in bringing the US into the war, especially on the European front. Hitler, when declaring war on the United States on December 11,1941, mentioned both of these factors as key in deciding to go to war with the United States.

With the difficult start of the war and the need to buy time to carry out the relocation deep into the country of military and other industries, lend-lease in the USSR was at first mainly in the form of vital supplies of American and British military equipment and equipment in the form of thousands of aircraft, armored vehicles, military and other ships, vehicles, railway equipment, hundreds of thousands and millions of tons and units of aviation fuel, shells for guns, cartridges for submachine guns and machine guns (differing from the calibers used in the USSR) weapons, car tires, spare parts for tanks, aircraft and vehicles. Since 1943, when the relocated industry developed in full measure, but food reserves were exhausted, and the leadership of the Allies ceased to doubt the USSR’s ability for a long-term war, the USSR began to import mainly strategic materials (non-ferrous metal and the like), equipment for industry and products due to the food crisis (see below).

Restrictions in the supply of weapons from the United States and Britain concerned mainly in terms of the supply of heavy bombers. The supply of four-engine bombers with a large bomb load and long range was evaded by the Allies under various pretexts. Obviously, the Allies saw a threat in the USSR’s access to these weapons in the post-war period. Without a doubt, this to a certain extent worked against achieving victory over Nazi Germany: the USSR had limited forces for long-range bomber aviation and, in war conditions, could not even make up for losses in it. Also top secret were research on the creation of nuclear weapons.

With the exception of much smaller (especially from the USSR) counter deliveries, due to the fact that deliveries of military equipment and materials lost during the war were not recoverable, lend-lease was eventually paid for by recipients (including from the USSR and Western allies) in very small shares (a few percent) and mostly with a long delay (decades later). However, one should not underestimate the importance of such “reciprocal lend-lease”. For example, the decision of the USSR on US access to the technology for the production of gunpowder for multiple rocket launchers turned out to be especially valuable for the United States in wartime conditions.(“Katyusha“). The USSR had priority and a significant advantage in the development of this type of weapon at that time. Although such a decision to transfer production technology was forced for the USSR, it made it possible to establish the production of the necessary gunpowders in the USA for Katyushas. Thus, the United States was able to solve the important task in wartime conditions of quickly providing its own army with these weapons, which were of great importance in the conditions of World War II.

Deliveries to the USSR

See also: Aviation Lend-Lease in the USSR, Naval Lend-Lease in the USSR, and Railway Lend-Lease in the USSR

Deliveries from the USA

• Negotiations on the First Delivery Protocol began on September 29, 1941 at the Moscow Conference and ended with the signing on October 1, 1941.
• The second protocol, known as the “Washington Protocol”, was signed on 10/06/1942.
• The third protocol, known as the “London Protocol”, was signed on 10/19/1943.
• The fourth delivery protocol was signed in Ottawa on April 17, 1944.

Several additional programs were subordinated to the main above Protocols of delivery, among which were the “Arctic Program” for the supply of Soviet Arctic ports, the Outpost program for the construction of ports in the Far East of the USSR, the program for the creation of the Trans-Siberian air transport system (Northern Siberian Air Route Program), which began to operate at the end of March, and the “Project Milepost” (Project Milepost), which ensured the actions of the USSR in the Far East.

Supplies under the Lend-Lease program that were not delivered to the USSR at the end of World War II, but were by that time in warehouses or in production, were provided to the Soviet Union under the so-called “pipeline agreement” (Pipeline Agreement), signed on 15.X.1945. Under this agreement, the USSR undertook to pay for deliveries in dollars and with a small percentage. Deliveries under this agreement were valued at $222 million and consisted only of industrial equipment and spare parts. In particular, the following was supplied: electric generators, steam boilers, engines, motors, transformers, forging and pressing equipment, mining equipment, various machine tools (including precision and semi-automatic). The USSR did not fully pay for these deliveries.

In August 1945, the UN launched a program of assistance to Ukraine and Belarus. The cost of the program was $250 million. The program included food supplies; clothing, textiles and footwear; medicines; agricultural equipment and seeds; industrial equipment. Initially, the program provided for the payment of all deliveries, however – after representatives of the BSSR explained that, according to the constitution of the USSR, the republic does not have foreign currency, which is at the exclusive disposal of the government of the USSR – payments under this program were suspended, and all deliveries (completed by May 1947) were produced free of charge.

Routes and volume of deliveries

 

Allied supplies were very unevenly distributed over the years of the war. After the Japanese attack on the United States on December 7, 1941, massive shipments from the United States were suspended, and were resumed after Roosevelt’s order of December 28,1941, with the intention of catching up by April 1,1942.

However, the situation returned to normal only in the second half of 1943. Of the 800 aircraft and 1000 tanks promised by England, which the USSR was supposed to receive in October-December 1941, 669 aircraft arrived (for comparison, as of October 1, 1941, there were 568 aircraft in the three fronts defending Moscow, and 389 of them were serviceable) and 487 tanks. From October 1941 to June 30, 1942, the United States sent to the USSR 545 aircraft, 783 tanks, more than three times less than promised, as well as 16,502 trucks, that is, more than five times less than planned.

The main routes and the volume of transported goods are shown in the following table:

Delivery routes	tonnage, thousand tons	% of total
Pacific	8244	47.1
Trans-Iranian	4160	23.8
Arctic convoys	3964	22.6
Black Sea	681	3.9
Soviet Arctic	452	2.6
Total	17 501	100.0

Three routes – the Pacific, trans-Iranian and Arctic convoys – provided a total of 93.5% of total deliveries. None of these routes were safe.

 

The fastest (and most dangerous) route was the Arctic convoys. In July-December 1941, 40% of all deliveries went through exactly this route, and about 15% of the goods sent, due to the activities of the Luftwaffe and the Kriegsmarine, ended up on the ocean floor. According to other sources, the losses were two times less. The sea portion of the journey from the US East Coast to Murmansk took about two weeks.

Cargo with northern convoys also went through Arkhangelsk and Molotovsk (now Severodvinsk), from where, along a hastily completed railway line, cargo went to the front. There was no bridge across the Northern Dvina yet, and for the transfer of equipment in winter, a meter layer of ice was frozen from river water, since the natural thickness of the ice (65 cm in the winter of 1941) did not allow rails with wagons to withstand the weight. Further, the cargo was sent by rail to the south, to the central, rear part of the USSR.

The Pacific route, which provided about half of Lend-Lease supplies, was relatively (though far from completely) safe. With the outbreak of the Pacific War on December 7,1941, transportation here could only be provided by Soviet sailors, and merchant ships sailed only under the Soviet flag. All non-freezing straits were controlled by Japan, and Soviet ships were subjected to forced searches and sometimes sunk. The sea part of the journey from the western coast of the United States to the Far Eastern ports of the USSR took 18-20 days.

 

The first deliveries to the USSR along the Trans-Iranian route began in November 1941, when 2972 ​​tons of cargo were sent.

To increase the volume of supplies, it was necessary to carry out a large-scale modernization of the transport system of Iran, in particular, ports in the Persian Gulf, roads and the Trans-Iranian railway (Trans-Iranian route). To this end, the Allies (USSR and Great Britain) occupied Iran in August. From May 1942, deliveries averaged – 80-90 thousand tons per month, and in the second half of 1943 – up to 200 thousand tons per month. Further, the delivery of goods was carried out by the ships of the Caspian military flotilla, which until the end of 1942 were subjected to active attacks by German aircraft. Part of the cargo was loaded in the ports of the Persian Gulf on trucks, also supplied to the USSR, and they were delivered through Iran by Soviet drivers to the territory of the USSR. The maritime part of the journey from the east coast of the United States to the coast of Iran took about 75 days.

Especially for the needs of lend-lease in Iran, several automobile factories were built, which were under the control of General Motors. The largest were called TAP I (Truck Assembly Plant I) at Andimeshk and TAP II at Khorramshahr. A total of 184,112 vehicles were sent to the USSR during the war years from Iranian enterprises. Vehicles were distilled along the following routes: Tehran – Ashgabat, Tehran – Astara – Baku, Julfa – Ordzhonikidze. In 1945, both plants were dismantled and taken to the USSR.

The Black Sea route began to function actively from the beginning of 1945, when, after the liberation of Greece, ships began to pass through the straits.

During the war years, there were two more Lend-Lease air routes. According to one of them, planes “under their own power” flew to the USSR from the USA through the South Atlantic, Africa and the Persian Gulf, according to another – through Alaska, Chukotka and Siberia. On the second route, known as “Alsib” (“Alaska – Siberia”), 7925 aircraft were deployed.

During the war years, Vladivostok processed imported cargo almost four times more than Murmansk and almost five times more than Arkhangelsk.

 

Cargo supplied by the Allies to the Soviet Union from Great Britain

 

Between June 1941 and May 1945, a total of 4 million tons of military cargo, including food and medicine, were delivered to the USSR. The cost of arms supplied by Great Britain to the USSR amounted to 308 million pounds (not including naval weapons), the cost of food and raw materials amounted to 120 million pounds. In accordance with the Anglo-Soviet agreement of June 27, 1942, military aid sent from Great Britain to the Soviet Union during the war was completely free of charge. At the same time, it must be borne in mind that before this date the USSR paid for deliveries from Great Britain in gold and currency. The total amount of payment today can be estimated at 55 tons of gold. The fact of these deliveries is widely known in the world due to the well-known case of the death of one of the ten ships carrying gold. This is the sinking in April 1942 of the British cruiser Edinburgh, which was transporting a valuable cargo of 5500 kg of gold from the USSR to Britain.

Another problem in Britain’s military supplies was the rather low level of military equipment. This issue eventually found its way into high-level correspondence between heads of state. Despite the fact that this was specifically stipulated as “little things”, in a letter from the head of the USSR I.V. Stalin to Prime Minister Churchill, the facts of the incompleteness of the arriving aircraft were mentioned. Also, the USSR, to a certain extent, expressed dissatisfaction with the fact that the supply of modern aircraft was limited. For example, in 1941-42. no deliveries of Spitfire fighters were made. Dissatisfaction was also caused by the fact of delivery in 1941-42. stockpiles of chemical weapons.

In general, it can be said that the supply of weapons and materials from Britain was limited primarily due to the difficult economic situation in Britain, although incomparably more favorable in comparison with the USSR, but nevertheless noticeably tense due to the naval blockade by Germany and the need engagement of forces against Germany and Italy on the African front.

 

Cargo supplied to the Soviet Union from the USA by years

 

The amount of assistance to the Soviet Union from the United States within the framework of Lend-Lease over the years reached the following amounts (in million dollars) :

Year	All products 9159.8	Military equipment 3837.6	Peaceful goods 5322.2
1941	29.5	29.5	—
1942	1363.3	723.7	639.6
1943	2965.9	1291.1	1674.8
1944	3429.1	1060.4	2368.7
1945	1372.0	732.9	639.1

In total, the Soviet Union received $ 9.4 billion in aid, of which 41.15% was military equipment. With transportation costs, United States aid reached $11.3 billion.

Value of Lend Lease Supplies

The lend-lease program was mutually beneficial both for the USSR (and other recipient countries) and for the United States. The USSR won the necessary time to relocate the military and other industries inland and closed the “bottlenecks” vital for the war at that time in the supply of the army and industry, for which the Soviet government itself determined the range of desired Lend-Lease supplies.

Deliveries of military equipment to the USSR are summarized in the following table.

Products	Deliveries from the USA	Shipments from the British Empire	Production in the USSR (1941-45)	Ratio (supply/production)
Aircraft	11 400	over 7000	157 261	11.7%
Armored vehicles ( tanks, self- propelled guns, armored personnel carriers)	12 000	6564	105 251	17.6%
motor vehicles	427 284	5232	265 600	163%
locomotives	1977	4	825	240%
Motorcycles	35 170	1721	27 216	136%

The following were also delivered to the Soviet Union under Lend-Lease: more than 5,000 anti-tank guns ; 131,633 automatic weapons (mainly submachine guns); pistols 12,997 ; rifles 8218 pieces; explosives: 345,735 tons (including 123,150 tons of TNT; 107,683 tons of toluene; 31,933 tons of dynamite); gunpowder 127,000 tons; high purity ethanol (for the manufacture of explosives) 331,066 liters; detonators 903,000 pieces; radio stations 35,800 units; radars 2074 units; anti-submarine ships 105 units; torpedo boats 202 units; cargo ships 90 units; submarines 4 units; engines for boats and ships 7784 pieces; 11,075 freight wagons; locomotives 1981 pieces; tractors 8071 pieces; metal-cutting machines 38,100 pieces; telephones 2,500,000; food 4,478,000 tons; machinery and equipment for $1,078,965,000; building equipment for $10,910,000; steel 2,800,000 tons; non-ferrous metals 802,000 tons; oil products 2,670,000 tons; chemicals 842,000 tons; cotton 106,893 tons; leather 49,860 tons; tires 3,786,000 pieces; army boots 15,417,000 pairs; blankets 1,541,590 pieces; buttons 257 million.

 

One of the decisive values ​​for the Soviet Union in general and for the Red Army in particular was Lend-Lease food supplies (1,750,000 tons were supplied from the USA alone). Almost the entire army, as well as a significant proportion of the civilian population (mainly employees of key military factories and nomenklatura), at the final stage of the war were mainly on Lend-Lease food supply with stew, butter, chocolate, etc. And besides, we must remember that food supplies could in any case be easily used up and were not subject to return or payment in such a case. Moreover, it can be confidently asserted that, with the exhaustion of food reserves at the beginning of the war, in 1943-1945, domestic agriculture, for the most part devastated by the war in the occupied granaries of Ukraine, the North Caucasus, the Chernozem region and remaining untouched only in part of the Non-Black Earth region and in the Volga region (and the virgin lands of Kazakhstan and Southern Siberia had not yet been developed), was not able to feed the multimillion-strong army and civilian population. By 1943, an acute food crisis erupted, when the already meager food rations were tacitly reduced by almost a third. Therefore, by the middle of 1944, food supplies had supplanted metals and even some types of weapons in Soviet applications. In the total volume of goods imported at the end of the war, food occupied over 25% of the tonnage. According to the calorie content of this food based on wartime norms should have been enough to support a 10 millionth army for more than three years.

The USSR received from the USA 433,967 cars and 34,190 motorcycles, while in the USSR from the beginning of the war until the end of 1945 only 266 thousand cars and 27 thousand motorcycles were produced (excluding the chassis and components for the T-60 and T tanks). -70, BA-64 armored vehicles; on June 22, 1941, there were 281,377 vehicles in the Red Army; on August 23, 1941, 206,169 units were withdrawn from the national economy).

For the needs of the Navy, the following were delivered to the USSR: 318 warships (sweepers, torpedo boats, “big submarine hunters”), 2,141 aircraft, several thousand units of automatic anti-aircraft weapons, 3,776 sea mines, 21,273 bombs deep, 128 acoustic and electromagnetic trawls, 359 hydroacoustic systems, 1,724 different radio stations, 1,049 sets of radar equipment, 1,300 marine diesel engines, 159 diving stations and more than a hundred items of weapons, ship and coastal equipment, which were in short supply or not produced at all in the USSR.

The Studebaker largely replaced horse-drawn vehicles and tractors for towing 76mm and 122mm artillery systems. Good performance was also shown by the Dodge 3/4 t vehicles, towing artillery pieces up to 76 mm inclusive. The Willys passenger vehicles with two driving axles became a reliable means of reconnaissance, communications and command and control, as well as a light tractor for 45-mm anti-tank guns. There were also special-purpose vehicles – Ford amphibians (based on the Willys vehicle, 3520 units) as part of special battalions for crossing water barriers, and 723 GMC (based on a truck of the same brand), which were used mainly by engineering units during crossing.

By the end of the war (since July 17, 1944), the Lend-Lease Studebakers became the main chassis for the Katyusha multiple launch rocket systems. For 4 years of the war, out of 3374 automobile chassis used to mount launchers of guards rocket mortars, they amounted to 1845 – 54.7% (on the basis of the ZIS-6 – only 372, until September 1941; the remaining 17 types of chassis – 1157 – 34.3%). Almost all Katyushas assembled on the basis of Soviet cars were destroyed by the war. In total, the chassis suitable for the installation of launchers was delivered 5975. After the end of hostilities with Japan, the USSR decided to return American vehicles and the procedure for returning them to the United States began, while the return process was carried out almost completely, so it is currently problematic to find original American cars used during the hostilities, even in museums. For example, in the military-historical museum “Battle of Stalingrad” in Volgograd, already post-war domestic vehicles are presented as carriers of “Katyushas”.

 

The USSR received under Lend-Lease 622.1 thousand tons of railway rails (56.5% of its own production), 1928 locomotives (2.4 times more than produced in the USSR during the war years; before the war, the USSR had 25,000 locomotives) and 11,075 wagons (10.2 times more). At the same time, 98.5% of rolling stock imports fell at the end of the war and the post-war period – since 1944).

The USA delivered 2 million 13 thousand tons of aviation gasoline (together with the allies – 2 million 586 thousand tons) – almost 2/3 of the fuel used during the war years by Soviet aviation. In addition to finished aviation gasoline, oil refining equipment was supplied for its production on the territory of the USSR, and the volume of these deliveries was such that its own annual production of aviation gasoline increased from 110,000 tons in 1941 to 1,670,000 tons in 1944. Along with aircraft, the USSR received hundreds of tons of aviation spare parts, aviation ammunition, fuel, special airfield equipment and apparatus, including 9351 Americana radio station for installation on Soviet-made fighters, aircraft navigation equipment (radio compasses, autopilots, radars, sextants, artificial horizons).

Due to the fact that most of the shipyards were under occupation or blockade and due to the long production cycle, during the war years, Soviet shipbuilding was practically stopped, and the Soviet fleet received almost all of the about five hundred new ships under Lend-Lease, of which about 80 % were military – anti-submarine boats and ships, minesweepers, destroyers and submarines. Again, it must be borne in mind that all the warships received under the Lend-Lease program were returned after the end of hostilities with Japan to the United States (in this case, they should not be confused with the warships of Italy and Germany received as part of the division of war trophies under an agreement with allies).

Also, due to the fact that the main industrial centers of the country are located in the occupation or front-line zones and the fact that the main material and human resources were concentrated on the production of the main types of weapons and ammunition, high shares of machine-building and instrument-making products were received under Lend-Lease (as instruments and equipment for the military machinery and ground support, as well as means and equipment for industrial purposes such as machine tools or for national economic purposes such as tractors), as well as the chemical industry.

Calculating the total share of lend-lease supplies in the general and military production of the USSR is a difficult task, since many documents on military production and their components are still classified. N. A. Voznesensky’s statement in the book “The Military Economy of the USSR during the Patriotic War”, that in general the share was 4% of Soviet production, does not fully reflect reality, since for some types of production and supply this share is several times higher and even dozens of times. In addition, quite often lend-lease deliveries were included in national production. For example, the Kazan Gunpowder Plant manufactured more than 103,000 tons of gunpowder, including special delivery gunpowder (supplied by the allies under Lend-Lease), about 22,000 tons were used during the war years.. Considering that this plant produced charges for the Katyushas, ​​which required a different composition of gunpowder (less dense), it is not clear what share in the production of gunpowder in the final count was predominant. The same calculation problem existed in almost all industries of the USSR during the war.

Comparative data on the role of lend-lease in providing the Soviet economy with certain types of materials and food during the war is given below:

 

Materials	USSR production	lend-lease	Ratio, %
Explosives, thousand tons	558	295.6	53%
Copper, thousand tons	534	404	76%
Aluminum, thousand tons	283	301	106%
Tin, thousand tons	13	29	223%
Cobalt, tons	340	470	138%
Aviation gasoline, thousand tons	4700	2586	55%
Vehicle tires, thousand pieces	8368	3659	30.49%
Railway wagons	1086	11 075	1020%
Railway rails, thousand tons	1,101.1	622.1	57%
Wool, thousand tons	360.5	98	27.2%
Sugar, thousand tons	995	658	66%
Canned meat, million cans	432.5	2077	480%
Animal fats, thousand tons	565	602	107%

For a better understanding of the scale of lend-lease assistance, it is enough to look at the official figures on the size of the foreign trade of the USSR in 1940. N. Voznesensky, former chairman of the State Planning Commission, published the following data on the export and import of goods to the USSR, in millions of Soviet rubles and dollars on the Foreign Trade Balance of the Soviet Union in 1940 :

1940	million rubles	million dollars
Export all:	1412	266.4
Including to Germany		190.3
Including the United States, Canada and the UK		26.1
Import all:	1446	272.8
Including from Germany		128.6
Including from the United States, Canada and the UK		94.2

 

Lend-Lease debts and their payment

Immediately after the war, the United States sent a proposal to the countries receiving lend-lease assistance to return the surviving military equipment and pay off the debt for what the allies wished to keep, in order to obtain new loans. Since the lend-lease law provided for the write-off of used military equipment and materials, the Americans insisted on paying only for civilian supplies: railway transport, power plants, steamships, trucks and other equipment that was in the recipient countries as of September 2, 1945. The United States did not demand compensation for the military equipment destroyed during the battles. Nevertheless, the write-off and actual destruction of military equipment was stipulated. The USSR decided to completely write off all military equipment received under Lend-Lease: tanks, artillery pieces, artillery tractors, military aircraft and vehicles.

USSR

The volume of American Lend-Lease deliveries amounted to about $10.8 billion. According to the lend-lease law, only equipment that survived during the war was subject to payment; to agree on the final amount, immediately after the end of the war, Soviet-American negotiations began. In the United States, it was initially calculated that the amount payable for the surviving civilian machinery and equipment, taking into account their wear and tear, is $ 2.6 billion, for negotiations this amount was halved, to $ 1.3 billion. At the 1948 negotiations, the Soviet representatives agreed to pay only $170 million and met with the predictable refusal of the American side. Negotiations in 1949 also came to nothing (the Soviet side increased the proposed amount to $200 million with a 50-year installment plan, while the American side reduced it to $1 billion with a 30-year installment plan). In 1951, the Americans twice reduced the amount of the payment, which became equal to $800 million, but the Soviet side agreed to pay only $300 million. According to the Soviet government, the calculation should have been carried out not in accordance with the real debt, but on the basis of precedent. This precedent was to be the proportions in determining the debt between the United States and Great Britain, which were fixed as early as March 1946. As a result, the United States agreed with the proposals of the USSR

An agreement with the USSR on the procedure for paying off lend-lease debts was concluded only in 1972. Under this agreement, the USSR undertook to pay $722 million by 2001, including interest. By July 1973, three payments totaling $48 million were made, after which the payments were stopped due to the introduction by the American side of discriminatory measures in trade with the USSR (Jackson-Vanik Amendment). In June, during the talks between the presidents of the USA and the USSR, the parties returned to the discussion of debt. A new deadline for the final repayment of the debt was set – 2030, and the amount – $ 674 million.

After the collapse of the USSR, the question arose sharply – to whom the obligations for the debts of the former USSR (including lend-lease debts) are transferred.

On December 4, 1991, 8 republics of the USSR, including the RSFSR, signed the “Agreement on Succession in Respect of the External Public Debt and Assets of the USSR”, which fixed the share of each republic in the debts (and assets) of the former USSR. At the same time, the Russian share was set at 61.34%. The treaty, however, was signed only by a part of the republics of the former USSR; the Baltic countries, Azerbaijan, Moldova, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan did not sign it.

In 1992-1994, however, the Russian Federation signed bilateral agreements with the successor countries of the USSR on the “zero option”, according to which the Russian Federation assumed the service of the entire state debt of the former USSR in exchange for the refusal of other republics from their almost half share in all assets of the USSR (gold and foreign exchange reserves, property abroad, property of the armed forces, etc.) In this regard, on April 2, 1993, the government of the Russian Federation announced that it would assume responsibility for all the debts of the USSR.

Technically, the debts of the USSR were divided into debts to governments (Paris Club) and debts to private banks (London Club); the lend-lease debt was a debt to the US government, that is, part of the debt to the Paris Club. Russia fully repaid its debt to the Paris Club in August.

UK and Canada

The volume of Great Britain’s debts to the USA amounted to 4.33 billion US dollars, to Canada -1.19 billion US dollars. The last payment of $83.25 million (to the United States) and $22.7 million (to Canada) was made on December 29,2006.

France

On May 28,1946, France signed a package of treaties with the United States (known as the Blum-Byrnes Agreement) that settled the French debt for lend-lease supplies in exchange for a series of trade concessions from France. In particular, France has significantly increased quotas for showing foreign (primarily American) films on the French film market.

China

The debt of the Republic of China (Taiwan) to the United States for Lend-Lease deliveries amounted to $187 million. Since 1979, the United States has recognized the People’s Republic of China (PRC) as the sole legitimate government of China, and therefore the heir to all previous agreements (including lend-lease supplies). Nevertheless, in 1989, the US demanded that Taiwan (not China) repay its Lend-Lease debt. The further fate of Chinese debt is not clear.

Iran

The amount payable for the Iranian lend-lease debt was determined by the US-Iranian agreement concluded in December 1945 – $ 8.5 million, which Tehran had to pay in installments starting from 1946. In the same month, an agreement was signed on the sale to the Shah’s government at a reduced price of American federal property in Iran.

Lend-Lease of state and military figures, politicians, historians, publicists

 

At the beginning of September 1941, in a telegram to W. Churchill, I. V. Stalin asked to provide assistance to the Soviet Union as soon as possible:

… All this led to a weakening of our defense capability and put the Soviet Union in front of a mortal threat. Here the question is appropriate: how to get out of this more than unfavorable situation? I think that there is only one way out of this situation: to create already this year a second front somewhere in the Balkans or in France, capable of pulling 30-40 German divisions from the eastern front, and at the same time providing the Soviet Union with 30 thousand tons of aluminum by the beginning of October. and monthly minimum assistance in the amount of 400 aircraft and 500 tanks (small or medium). Without these two types of assistance, the Soviet Union will either be defeated or weakened to the point that it will lose for a long time the ability to provide assistance to its allies by its active actions on the front of the fight against Nazism.

— Correspondence of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR with the Presidents of the United States and Prime Ministers of Great Britain during the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945. In 2 volumes 1958: M. Gospolitizdat

Already in November 1941, in his letter to US President Roosevelt, I. V. Stalin wrote:

Your decision, Mr. President, to grant the Soviet Union an interest-free loan to the value of $1,000,000,000 to meet deliveries of munitions and raw materials to the Soviet Union is accepted by the Soviet Government with heartfelt gratitude as vital aid to the Soviet Union in its tremendously and onerous struggle against our common enemy – bloody Hitlerism.

During the Tehran conference in 1943, Stalin, at a gala dinner in honor of Winston Churchill’s 69th birthday, made a toast in which he called the United States a country of machines and said that “Without these machines supplied under Lend-Lease, we would have lost this war” (Without the use of those machines, through Lend-Lease, we would lose this war). Stalin’s words were recorded in the journal of the daily events of the President of the United States during the Tehran Conference, which was published in the American collection The Foreign Policy of the United States. Cairo and Tehran conferences of 1943″ in 1961 on page 469. According to other sources at this conference, Stalin gave the following assessment of American assistance: “Without American production the United Nations [the Allies] could never have won the war.”

In the note No. 1447-s dated May 27, 1963, the Chairman of the State Security Committee V.E. Semichastny in the Central Committee of the CPSU in the mood of G.K. Zhukov noted the following:

… Now they say that the allies never helped us… But it cannot be denied that the Americans drove us so many materials, without which we could not form our reserves and could not continue the war… We received 350 thousand vehicles, but what vehicles!. We didn’t have explosives, gunpowder. There was nothing to equip rifle cartridges. The Americans really helped us out with gunpowder and explosives. And how much they drove us sheet steel. How could we quickly establish the production of tanks, if not for the American help with steel. And now they represent the matter in such a way that we had all this in abundance

– Karpov V.V. Marshal Zhukov: Opala. — M.: Veche, 1994.

1. K. Zhukov himself refuted the above quote, as stated in the report of V. E. Semichastny to Khrushchev No. 1651-s dated June 17, 1963:

… I believe that I have never seen or read a more untrue story than the German generals wrote. So this, I say, is definitely a strained thing. Apparently, the person who spoke or reported about this, conveys his own opinion and attributes it to me. The same goes for American aid. I say, spoke a lot, wrote a lot of articles, at one time spoke publicly and gave an appropriate assessment of American assistance and victims in the Second World War. So it’s the same thing pulled from somewhere.

– Military archives of Russia v.1, 1993, p.238.

1. I. Mikoyan highly appreciated the role of lend-lease, during the war he was responsible for the work of seven allied people’s commissariats (trade, procurement, food, fish and meat and dairy industries, maritime transport and the river fleet) and, as the country’s people’s commissar for foreign trade, since 1942 of the year, who led the reception of allied Lend-Lease supplies:

-… when we began to receive American stew, combined fat, egg powder, flour, and other products, what significant additional calories our soldiers immediately received! And not only the soldiers: something also fell to the rear.

Or take car deliveries. After all, as far as I remember, taking into account losses along the way, we received about 400,000 first-class cars of the Studebaker, Ford, Jeeps and amphibians type for that time. Our entire army actually turned out to be on wheels and what wheels! As a result, its maneuverability increased and the pace of the offensive increased noticeably.

Yes…” Mikoyan drawled thoughtfully. “Without Lend-Lease, we would probably have fought for another year and a half extra.

In his memoirs “Memories and Reflections”, G.K. Zhukov also touches on the topic of inter-allied relations in the most difficult year for the USSR and the allies in 1942, directly during the Battle of Stalingrad, before the radical turning point in the war:

At 22.00 (September 10, 1942) we were at the Supreme, in his office.

Shaking hands, which rarely happened to him, he said indignantly:

– Dozens, hundreds of thousands of Soviet people give their lives in the fight against fascism, and Churchill is bargaining for two dozen “Hurricanes”. And their “Hurricanes” are rubbish, our pilots don’t like this vehicle… – And then he continued in a completely calm tone without any transition: – Well, what did you think? Who will report…

In his memoirs, N. S. Khrushchev directly touched on the importance of Lend-Lease:

 

I would like to express my candid opinion about Stalin’s views on whether the Red Army and the Soviet Union could have coped with Nazi Germany and survived the war without aid from the United States and Britain. First, I would like to tell you about some remarks Stalin made and repeated several times when we were “discussing freely” among ourselves. He stated bluntly that if the United States had not helped us, we would not have won the war. If we had had to fight Nazi Germany one on one, we could not have stood up against Germany’s pressure, and we would have lost the war. No one ever discussed this subject officially, and I don’t think Stalin left any written evidence of his opinion, but I will state here that several times in conversations with me he noted that these were the actual circumstances. He never made a special point of holding a conversation on the subject, but when we were engaged in some kind of relaxed conversation, going over international questions of the past and present, and when we would return to the subject of the path we had traveled during the war, that is what he said. When I listened to his remarks, I was fully in agreement with him, and today I am even more so.

The first official historical assessment of the role of lend-lease was given by Gosplan Chairman Nikolai Voznesensky in his book “The Military Economy of the USSR during the Patriotic War”, published in 1948 :

… if we compare the volume of deliveries by the allies of industrial goods to the USSR with the volume of industrial output at the socialist enterprises of the USSR over the same period, it turns out that the share of these deliveries in relation to domestic production during the period of the war economy will be only about 4%.

– Voznesensky N. The military economy of the USSR during the Patriotic War – M.: Gospolitizdat, 1948

The 4% figure was published without detail and is disputed. Then these “only about 4%” became the main characterization of Lend-Lease in Soviet history writings. Voznesensky’s assessment clearly contradicts the data published in the post-Soviet period on the volumes of Soviet production and Lend-Lease deliveries (see table above).

According to Stettinius, Senator George, Chairman of the Finance Committee, explained why it is worth spending money on the Lend-Lease program:

[USA] is now spending about 8 billion a month. If it were not for the preparations that we made during these months, gaining time, the war, I am convinced, would have lasted a year longer. We spend up to 100 billion dollars a year on the war, and besides, we could lose a huge number of lives of the best sons of the country. Even by shortening the war by only half a year, we will save 48 billion dollars by spending only 11 billion, and the blood of our soldiers, the tears of our mothers cannot be estimated at all…

In his memoirs, Major General of the Wehrmacht Tank Forces F. Mellenthin wrote that by the spring of 1943 the military situation in Germany had deteriorated greatly. Tunisia threatened to become the new “Stalingrad”, Anglo-American strategic bombing kept the industry of the Reich in constant tension. A significant part of the fighter aviation was transferred from Russia to Europe to fight the bombers. The position of Italy in the face of the imminent Allied invasion was desperate. Germany is forced to keep large forces in Italy and Western Europe. On the Eastern Front, the Germans lost air superiority. Soviet aviation significantly increased its power – Anglo-American assistance also had an effect. The general balance of forces in the eastern theater of military operations has changed, it has become obvious: “We are facing a ruthless enemy, who has huge and even, apparently, inexhaustible reserves”.

Robert Jones – Professor of History

In published studies, professor-historian Robert Jones reproduces the following version of the mutual anti-fascist actions of the USA, Great Britain and the USSR in the first months of Nazi Germany’s aggression against the Soviet Union.

1. Jones writes that, according to Joseph Davis , the former ambassador to the USSR: “Russia should be provided with any possible assistance, and this must be done as soon as possible.” He believed that the struggle between the Nazis and the Soviet Union would be a “turning point”. US President Roosevelt supported this opinion and declared that if the Russians could hold out until October, the winter weather would stop the Germans and allow them to buy precious time to organize assistance to Russia.

US Ambassador to the USSR Lawrence Steingard three times (July 1, 2, 3, 1941) telegraphed from Moscow that Stalin would not agree to a separate peace with the Nazis. Given this information, Roosevelt and HopkinsOn July 11, 1941, they met in the presidential office and discussed the problem of providing assistance to England and the Soviet Union. Roosevelt decided to send Hopkins to London to negotiate with Churchill: it was necessary to know exactly what the requirements of the British would be, since a significant part of the aid for Russia was supposed to be allocated from what was supplied as military aid to England. In London, Hopkins was received by Harriman. Both agreed on the provision of urgent military assistance to the Russians. Hopkins, realizing that it was necessary to accurately assess the needs of Russia, sent a telegram to Roosevelt on July 25 asking permission to go to Russia. On July 26, permission was received. Roosevelt asked Stalin to “treat Hopkins with the same confidence as if he were addressing him, Roosevelt, directly. “from Invergordon to Murmansk. On the evening of July 29, Hopkins met with Stalin in the Kremlin. Hopkins gave Stalin a message from Roosevelt and asked: “What would you like to receive from the United States in the first place.” Stalin considered 20 thousand anti-aircraft guns with a caliber of 20 to 37 mm, aluminum, machine guns with a caliber of 12.7 mm and more than a million 7.62 mm rifles as priority wishes. Agreed to hold from October 1 to October 15, 1941, a conference of interested parties on supply issues. Stalin expressed the hope that the United States would also enter the war against Germany, since it would be difficult for England and the USSR to crush Hitler alone.

On the initiative of Roosevelt, on August 2, 1941, an intergovernmental Committee for the provision of military assistance to the Soviet Union was created. At the meeting of the Committee, the parties exchanged diplomatic notes. The American note pointed to the policy of supporting the Soviet Union in the fight against the Nazis: “The United States has decided to provide economic assistance aimed at strengthening the Soviet Union in its fight against armed aggression.” The aggressor attacking the Soviet Union also threatens the security of other peoples, so the strengthening of Russia is in the interests of the national security of the United States.

On August 9, 1941, a meeting of the American and British delegations took place aboard the heavy cruiser Augusta in the North Atlantic. Roosevelt and Churchill spoke in favor of holding a conference on the problem of equipping the Red Army in Moscow as soon as possible, so that questions “could be discussed directly.”

In mid-August, Soviet troops in the southern direction withdrew beyond the Dnieper. To the north, German tanks rushed through Smolensk to Moscow. In a telegram to Churchill on September 3, Stalin reported significant losses in the country’s industry and asked to open a second front. He requested aluminum, combat aircraft, and tanks.

On September 15, preliminary Anglo-American talks were held in London in order to agree on mutual actions at the forthcoming Moscow conference. It was necessary to develop a common opinion in the form of “proposals” about what kind of assistance both peoples (American, British) could provide to the Russians. During the negotiations, it turned out that “what the Americans offered was a blow to the British, since it meant a significant reduction in supplies intended for themselves” (it was necessary to supply the British troops involved in the Mediterranean theater of operations at the proper level, including including in hostilities with the Italo-German troops in North Africa – on the territory of Egypt and the Maghreb, the British Navy, which continuously covered the convoys, also the British Air Force, which regularly carried out massive bombing of the industrial regions of the Reich). However, US President Roosevelt proposed constructive steps to resolve mutual problems.

On September 20, 1941, Kyiv was abandoned by the Russians. The industrial potential of the Soviet Union fell by about half. Steinghardt called for more Anglo-American supplies to help the Russians continue the war. The Red Army heroically held back the enemy on the outskirts of Leningrad and Moscow. However, resilience alone was not enough. Huge material losses had to be replenished, otherwise, sooner or later, the Soviet Union would have to give in.

On September 21, on the heavy cruiser London of the Royal Forces of the Royal Navy of Great Britain, an Anglo-American delegation went to Russia for negotiations with Stalin. Following the cruiser, on September 22, another part of the delegation took off with two American B-24 bombers. This was the first US Air Force flight over Luftwaffe-controlled territory. On September 28, 1941, a supply conference opened in Moscow. Representatives of the United States and Great Britain Harriman and Beaverbrook met with Stalin three times. When discussing proposals for deliveries, Stalin put tanks in first place, then anti-tank guns, medium bombers, anti-aircraft artillery, armor plates for tanks, fighters, reconnaissance aircraft, barbed wire. He asked to open a second front, as well as to send British troops to fight in Ukraine.

On October 30, 1941, the situation near Moscow became catastrophic. Stalin spoke on the radio to his compatriots with an appeal to make every effort to save the fatherland. On the same day, Roosevelt sent a telegram to Stalin, where he said that he had considered the documents on the Moscow Conference and approved all the planned deliveries of weapons and raw materials to Russia. He ordered that they be carried out immediately by means of the American side. It was proposed to carry out deliveries worth up to one billion dollars under lend-lease. At the same time, the resulting debt should not be taxed with interest, but the payment of the debt should be made five years after the end of the war within a ten-year period. Simultaneously, the United States made it clear that “for all three governments (Great Britain, the United States, Soviet Union) it is unacceptable to assume any obligations regarding the details of the post-war device. And above all, the principle of the inadmissibility of any secret agreements should be observed. On November 4, 1941, in a reply telegram, Stalin noted that the Soviet government accepts your decision to provide an interest-free loan in the amount of $1 billion with heartfelt gratitude. Stalin expressed full agreement with the proposed conditions. From that moment on, Russia entered the list of countries receiving lend-lease assistance. that your decision to provide an interest-free loan in the amount of 1 billion dollars the Soviet government accepts with heartfelt gratitude. Stalin expressed full agreement with the proposed conditions. From that moment on, Russia entered the list of countries receiving lend-lease assistance. that your decision to provide an interest-free loan in the amount of 1 billion dollars the Soviet government accepts with heartfelt gratitude. Stalin expressed full agreement with the proposed conditions. From that moment on, Russia entered the list of countries receiving lend-lease assistance.

Scope of supply

Cargoes delivered from the Western Hemisphere to the Soviet Union under Lend-Lease from June 22, 1941 to September 20, 1945, by months and delivery routes (in tons):

Year and month b	All routes	Persian Gulf		Far East		Arctic		Black Sea		Through Alaska
		tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total
Total	17 499 861	4 159 117	23.8	8 243 397	47.1	3 964 231	22.7	680 723	3.9	452 393	2.5
Year and month b	All routes	Persian Gulf		Far East		Arctic		Black Sea		Through Alaska
		tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total
1941	360 778	13 502	3.7	193 299	53.6	153 977	42.7	0	0.0	0	0.0
June	2977	0	0.0	2988	100.0	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
July	27 567	0	0.0	27 567	100.0	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
August	97 483	0	0.0	93 113	95.5	4370	4.5	0	0.0	0	0.0
September	38 161	0	0.0	27 629	72.4	10 532	27.6	0	0.0	0	0.0
October	65 513	0	0.0	17 161	26.2	48 352	73.8	0	0.0	0	0.0
november	57 604	2972	5.2	13 559	23.5	41 073	71.3	0	0.0	0	0.0
December	71 462	10 530	14.7	11 282	15.8	49 650	69.5	0	0.0	0	0.0
Year and month b	All routes	Persian Gulf		Far East		Arctic		Black Sea		Through Alaska
		tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total
1942	2 453 097	705 259	28.8	734 020	29.9	949 711	38.7	0	0.0	64 107	2.6
January	88 597	34	0.05	26 047	29.4	62 516	70.6	0	0.0	0	0.0
February	92 670	5282	5.7	22 206	24.0	65 182	70.3	0	0.0	0	0.0
March	213 999	17 754	8.3	25 555	11.9	170 690	79.8	0	0.0	0	0.0
April	441 968	21 173	4.8	38 441	8.7	382 354	86.5	0	0.0	0	0.0
May	194 747	86 978	44.7	33 035	17.0	74 734	38.3	0	0.0	0	0.0
June	193 695	91 012	47.0	30 288	15.6	54 720	28.3	0	0.0	17675	9.1
July	183 362	62 492	34.1	63 313	34.5	13 351	7.3	0	0.0	44 206	24.1
August	215 543	65 598	30.4	78 616	36.5	69 013	32.0	0	0.0	2226	1.1
September	179 430	72 057	40.2	79 604	44.4	27 769	15.4	0	0.0	0	0.0
October	229 331	121 272	52.9	108 059	47.1	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
november	176 911	70 430	39.8	106 481	60.2	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
December	242 934	91 177	37.5	122 375	50.4	29 382	12.1	0	0.0	0	0.0
Year and month b	All routes	Persian Gulf		Far East		Arctic		Black Sea		Through Alaska
		tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total
1943	4794545	1606979	33.5	2388577	49.8	681043	14.2	0	0.0	117946	2.5
January	258055	86836	33.7	97671	37.8	73548	28.5	0	0.0	0	0.0
February	342055	40071	11.8	129004	37.7	172980	50.5	0	0.0	0	0.0
March	263209	131277	49.9	122646	46.6	9286	3.5	0	0.0	0	0.0
April	337572	143808	42.6	193764	57.4	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
May	349259	121002	34.6	216380	62.0	0	0.0	0	0.0	11877	3.4
June	275622	28786	10.4	230183	83.5	0	0.0	0	0.0	16653	6.1
July	336094	126184	37.5	152215	45.3	0	0.0	0	0.0	57695	17.2
August	469961	177153	37.7	261087	55.6	0	0.0	0	0.0	31721	6.7
September	511365	197886	38.7	313479	61.3	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
October	439655	192744	43.8	180872	41.4	66039	15.1	0	0.0	0	0.0
november	568620	194775	34.2	228964	40.3	144881	25.5	0	0.0	0	0.0
December	643078	166457	25.9	262312	40.8	214309	33.3	0	0.0	0	0.0
Year and month b	All routes	Persian Gulf		Far East		Arctic		Black Sea		Through Alaska
		tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total
1944	6217622	1788864	28.8	2848181	45.8	1452775	23.4	0	0.0	127802	2.0
January	599239	201713	33.7	176170	29.4	221356	36.9	0	0.0	0	0.0
February	341158	114161	33.5	100017	29.3	126980	37.2	0	0.0	0	0.0
March	351751	150500	42.8	91299	26.0	109952	31.2	0	0.0	0	0.0
April	408870	274791	67.2	134079	32.8	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
May	553376	289070	52.2	264306	47.8	0	0.0	0	0.0	0	0.0
June	522556	187349	35.9	307224	58.8	0	0.0	0	0.0	27983	5.3
July	624578	127393	20.4	275761	44.2	155760	24.9	0	0.0	65664	10.5
August	561533	36437	6.5	308614	55.0	185562	33.0	0	0.0	30920	5.5
September	579860	87861	15.2	298208	51.4	190556	32.9	0	0.0	3235	0.5
October	545414	156228	28.6	309441	56.8	79745	14.6	0	0.0	0	0.0
november	564628	95864	17.0	313916	55.6	154848	27.4	0	0.0	0	0.0
December	564659	67497	12.0	269146	47.7	228016	40.3	0	0.0	0	0.0
Year and month b	All routes	Persian Gulf		Far East		Arctic		Black Sea		Through Alaska
		tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total	tons	Percentage of total
1945	3673819	44513	1.2	2079320	56.6	726725	19.8	680723	18.5	142538	3.9
January	405762	31454	7.8	194914	48.0	118869	29.3	60525	14.9	0	0.0
February	450588	4497	1.0	181741	40.3	153278	34.0	111072	24.7	0	0.0
March	487030	4409	0.9	161786	33.2	148731	30.5	172104	35.4	0	0.0
April	540278	1232	0.2	193709	35.9	167180	30.9	178157	33.0	0	0.0
May	768295	2921	0.4	518212	67.4	138667	18.1	108495	14.1	0	0.0
June	329191	0	0.0	275018	83.5	0	0.0	21638	6.6	32535	9.9
July	408554	0	0.0	313360	76.7	0	0.0	1268	0.3	93926	23.0
August	234606	0	0.0	200369	85.4	0	0.0	18160	7.7	16077	6.9
September	49515	0	0.0	40211	81.2	0	0.0	9304	18.8	0	0.0

 

 

Notes to the section “Scope of supply”

a Total shipments from the Western Hemisphere, including goods from Canada. Includes about 488,000 tons lost en route, mainly in 1942. Does not include 555,000 tons of oil products coming from Allied-owned refineries in Iran.

b The volume of deliveries is given for the month of cargo release from western ports or air bases

The nomenclature of Lend-Lease supplies was determined by the Soviet government and was designed to plug the “bottlenecks” in the supply of industry and the army of the USSR.

 

Aircraft	22 150
tanks	10,000
Passenger SUVs and all-terrain vehicles	51 503
trucks	375 883
Motorcycles	35 170
Tractors	8071
Rifles	8218
Automatic weapons	131 633
Pistols	12 997
Explosives	345,735 tons
dynamite	70,400,000 pounds (31,933 tons)
Toluene	237,400,000 pounds (107,683 tons)
TNT	271,500,000 pounds (123,150 tons)
Gunpowder	127,000 tons
Detonators	903 000
Building equipment	$10,910,000
Freight wagons	11 155
locomotives	1981
cargo ships	90
anti-submarine ships	105
Torpedo boats	202
Minesweepers	99
Radars	445
Ship engines	7784
Food stocks	4,478,000 tons
Machinery and equipment	$1,078,965,000
Become	2,800,000 tons
non-ferrous metals	802,000 tons
Oil products	2,670,000 tons
chemicals	842,000 tons
Cotton	106,893 tons
Skin	49,860 tons
Shin	3,786,000
Army boots	15,417,000 pairs
Blankets	1 541 590
alcohol	331 066 l
Buttons	257 723 498