WI: no moscow gold?

Consequences

  • Germans would capture stalingrad

  • Germans would capture moscow

  • Increased LL from the allies

  • Historical LL

  • No change


Results are only viewable after voting.
What would happen if the soviets are unable to steal the spanish gold reserve? Not sure exactly what the ussr used it for in otl except bribing people during the cold war but would they still be strong enoughn to fight the germans when barbarossa comes along before they get LL from the US?
 
Steal? So you think Us Goverment stole Uk, France and other countries gold reserves? The gold was used to pay for weapons fuel and food so I don't call it steal. The same way you say, nazi germany stole spanish iron ore, tungsten and other valuables during WWII
 
... Not sure exactly what the ussr used it for in otl ...

Some was used to purchase raw and finished materials from the US in 1940 & 1941. Lend Lease was not extended to the USSR until the Germans attacked. Items arriving into the autumn of 1941 were paid for in cash and bater credits.

... but would they still be strong enoughn to fight the germans when barbarossa comes along before they get LL from the US?

The USSR had gold reserves before Spanish transfers. I suspect they would have been able to purchase the critical items without Spains gold, but it would be nice to know what their gold reserves in the 1930s - 1941 were. Also what other precious metals & critical raw materials they could have substituted.
 
Steal? So you think Us Goverment stole Uk, France and other countries gold reserves? The gold was used to pay for weapons fuel and food so I don't call it steal. The same way you say, nazi germany stole spanish iron ore, tungsten and other valuables during WWII

The gold was meant to be safeguarded so yes stolen. Spain did not buy military supplies for over 500 tonnes of gold.
 
The New York Times reported on August 7, 1936, that the Spanish gold reserves in Madrid were worth 718 million US dollars at the time, included the 173 tones that ended up in France.

This report of the CIA (page 54)

https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/DOC_0000496246.pdf

states that the Soviet gold reserves at the end of 1940 were about 2,8 billion gold and that the Spanish gold was worth about 522 million US dollars.

So I think that it might be a bit of a temporary trouble.
 
Thats roughly 20% difference. Guess knowing how much in gold the USSR spent on imports 1939-1941 would place that difference in perspective.
 
Steal? So you think Us Goverment stole Uk, France and other countries gold reserves? The gold was used to pay for weapons fuel and food so I don't call it steal.
IIRC whilst the Soviets did provide supplies in exchange for gold they played fast and loose with the values so as to overcharge the Spaniards to a large degree.
 
Simply it means no Winter Counter attack, actual Lend Lease deliveries kicked in on 30 September. All previous deliveries were paid for in Specie, no credit or barter allowed. And no there was no way to replace the specie payments any further with deliveries of resources and especially any manufactured goods. If they could they would have done so OTL and kept the gold.

Please remember it took several months for supplies to travel between the Russian ports and the front. So a gap in deliveries in July-August means a supply drop in November.

Worse many items delivered in those months were what I call value added goods. Items like ball bearings, clutch plates, and dynamo's which don't account for much tonnage, but was crucial for the Soviets maintaining any production at all.
 
See Gerald Howson's *Arms for Spain: The Untold Story of the Spanish Civil War* on how the Soviets gouged the Spanish Republic "by manipulating exchange rates between rubles to dollars and dollars to pesetas. Thus, while the ruble remained steady against the dollar throughout the late 1930s at approximately 5.3:1, the Soviets were converting the ruble at anywhere from 3.95 to 2.0 to the dollar, then converting the higher dollar value to pesetas for final billing to the Republic. The Spaniards never saw the original ruble price, and were thus never aware that the prices they were being charged were, on average (per Howson's estimate), over 25 percent higher than they should have been. 34 Howson believes that this price-jiggering resulted in overcharges of not less than $51 million." (I am quoting a review which is consistent with my own memory of what Howson wrote; I am not giving the URL because Google says the site is unsafe.)
 
Simply it means no Winter Counter attack, actual Lend Lease deliveries kicked in on 30 September. All previous deliveries were paid for in Specie, no credit or barter allowed. And no there was no way to replace the specie payments any further with deliveries of resources and especially any manufactured goods. If they could they would have done so OTL and kept the gold.

Please remember it took several months for supplies to travel between the Russian ports and the front. So a gap in deliveries in July-August means a supply drop in November.

Worse many items delivered in those months were what I call value added goods. Items like ball bearings, clutch plates, and dynamo's which don't account for much tonnage, but was crucial for the Soviets maintaining any production at all.

So how much worse do you think barbarossa woukd have turned out for the soviets lacking 20% of their otl gold reserves to purchase with leading up to the invasion disregarding the winter counter attack? Stalingrad? Moscow?
 
Thats roughly 20% difference. Guess knowing how much in gold the USSR spent on imports 1939-1941 would place that difference in perspective.
Well in
1939 Soviets imported $ 140.5 millions, exported for $ 87.2 millions (with US import $ 56.6 millions, export $ 25 millions)
1940 Soviets imported for $ 205 millions, exported for $ 201 millions (with US import $ 86.9 millions, export $ 20.7 millions)
1941 I found US supplied material for $ 20 millions in L-L. However not sure about that number and I am missing numbers for cash and carry before Soviets were approved for L-L
 
Thanks for this. Very useful.

1939 Soviets imported $ 140.5 millions, exported for $ 87.2 millions (with US import $ 56.6 millions, export $ 25 millions)
1940 Soviets imported for $ 205 millions, exported for $ 201 millions (with US import $ 86.9 millions, export $ 20.7 millions)
1941 I found US supplied material for $ 20 millions in L-L. However not sure about that number and I am missing numbers for cash and carry before Soviets were approved for L-L

If I am reading this correctly hat looks like a net of about 55 millions USD for 1939 & 1940. Not a big dent in the $ 2,800,000,000 in gold reserves claimed for 1940. Even if the cash & carry purchases for 1941 we're quadruple the $20 millions LL it's still does not look like a lot against the gold reserves.

Maybe someone else can come up with a source for some larger out flow of 28+ billion or something. We'll see.
 
Found Russian imports 1941 as 29 million rubles, 1942, 548 million rubles and 1943 2.5 billion rubles. Could be My previous post data for 1941 had wrong currency? Not sure.
 
Well, we'll look at some other sources & see what their numbers are.
Check this;
https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/mharrison/public/lendlease.pdf

Table 1 on page 38 says 20 million in aid. Table 2 on page 39 says shipments in 1941 1 million. Could be possible 20 million was allocated to Soviet Union but only 1 million arrived from US?
With exchange rate Soviet Ruble to $ 5.3

And I found before June 1941 Soviets Import from Germany was 45.1% and from USA 23.1% of total imports.
We know Soviets imported from Germany before Barbarossa some 423 million rubles. So their total import pre Barbarossa was 940 million rubles or 177 million dollars.

Their export in same time was to Germany was 59.5% (479 million rubles), USA 10%. So their total import pre Barbarossa was 805 million rubles or 151 million dollars.

From Table 1.:
https://historicalmemory.ru/2017/07/03/советско-германская-торговля-в-перво/


I guess their gold reserves for year 1941 even without Spanish gold should be fine.
Actually, if your numbers for gold reserves are fine, Soviets would be theoretically OK even for year 1942 without L-L.
 
Steal? So you think Us Goverment stole Uk, France and other countries gold reserves? The gold was used to pay for weapons fuel and food so I don't call it steal. The same way you say, nazi germany stole spanish iron ore, tungsten and other valuables during WWII
Regardless of what the money was spent on it was stolen then used 4 weapons against Germany. That may justify it or not but you can't say it wasn't stolen sorry just just my op
 
This report of the CIA (page 54) https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/DOC_0000496246.pdf

states that the Soviet gold reserves at the end of 1940 were about 2,8 billion gold and that the Spanish gold was worth about 522 million US dollars.

Thats roughly 20% difference. Guess knowing how much in gold the USSR spent on imports 1939-1941 would place that difference in perspective.

from the same report (page 51) "in 1937 the average cost of gold production in the USSR was 15,000 Rubles per kilogram. this gold could be sold in world markets at the official rate of exchange for only 5,900 Rubles"

reminds of Soviet era joke told by workers "they pretend to pay us and we pretend to work"

so they are (surprise!!) an inefficient and high cost producer, an indication of why the Spanish gold was considered such a windfall?

one article gives its importance (maybe a little too much) https://www.forbes.com/sites/briandomitrovic/2011/05/09/there-be-moscow-gold/#3a754cf4761b predicting regime demise without it or some other similar windfall.

not sure how you would determine what battle lost or city falls based on absence of Moscow Gold? it would seem if nothing else the equipment lost in initial stages of Barbarossa even harder to replace?
 
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