The first Soviet fishing expeditions to Spitsbergen and Iceland (1946—1952)

Spitsbergen area is one of the most important areas for the world and Russian fishing. In this article, based on archival materials and memoirs it is attempted to analyze how the geopolitical changes taking place in the world after the Second World War influenced the formation of the Soviet fisheries in the North Atlantic and in Spitsbergen area.

In the early postwar years, the Norwegian authorities expected to strengthen its position in relations with Moscow with the help of the Anglo-American support. The growing military cooperation with the United States and Western European countries was a part of this support. In 1946, the Soviet Ambassador in Norway N. D. Kuznetsov in a memorandum to the People's Commissariat of the USSR said: “The Norwegians, seeking to preserve the islands for themselves, make the question of Svalbard important for all the great powers, especially Britain and the United States”1. In the context of the Cold War, in which the Arctic areas assigned a significant role, it was vital for the Soviet Union not to turn the archipelago into a springboard for deployment of antiSoviet military threats. Nevertheless, the Soviet side had postponed the revision of the status of the archipelago until a more favorable time, not to let the annexationist intentions to appear. Such accusations, according to Moscow, could become an excuse of American presence in Iceland and Greenland.

Without increasing pressure through diplomatic channels, Moscow, at the same time, took steps to demonstrate the Soviet presence in these strategically important areas of the North Atlantic. As in the early twentieth century, one of the main ways was the intensification of domestic economic activity here. The main economic activities in these areas for the USSR were fishing and coal mining on Svalbard.

In the early postwar years, the increase in fish production had been a strategic objective. Without this it was unreal to solve the food problem in the country. A significant role in increasing the fish catch was withdrawn by fishermen of the North Basin. To solve this problem, it was necessary, first of all, to ensure a reliable supply of fuel fleets. The companies providing the North Basin with coal supply were depended on Svalbard coal. In the “Key indicators of the plan for five years” (1946—1950) for the association “Murmanryba” in 1947 it was stated: "On the positive solution of the question of the coal concessions the Svalbard, Svalbard was resumed to be transported to Murmansk to supply fish enterprises, after it was interrupted by the war"2. But the fishing areas near the coast of the Soviet, mastered by fishermen in the prewar years, could not provide the required rate of fishing capacity. The sharp increase in catches could be done only by the expansion of fishing areas, means going on the fishing ships in the oceans. The development of the economic activity of the USSR in the North Atlantic in the early postwar years was dictated not only by the economic necessity, but also by geopolitical interests.

In 1946—1950 the volume of fish catch of the fish industry in Murmansk and Arkhangelsk regions (Tralflot, Kola, White Sea and the Czech-Pechersk trusts) grew from 1325 thousand to 4,500 thousand centners3. In the “Explanatory Note to the 5-year development plan of the Association “Murmanryba” for 1946—1950" it was said: "trawler fleet will not be enough for the operation of the fishing areas, which it mastered and exploited before the war. Soviet trawlers in the first 5 post-war ears will have to learn and begin to exploit a number of new fishing places outside the normal range of their activities; develop commercial space in Nadezhda Island, Spitsbergen and Medvezhiy Island, fishing banks of the North-West and West coast of Norway "4.

Exploration of the fishing areas in Svalbard began before World War II. In June 1934 the archipelago was aimed at trapping expedition onboard the “Nikolai Knipovich” headed by Y.Y. Marti and the captain P.A. Polisadov. In Spitsbergen area herring was found. It was called “polar crease" After a few days in the area the boat "Vanguard" (Captain S.E.Edemsky) came to fish. After the 18-day work the crew returned to Murmansk with a catch of 25 tons of “polar crease" [1, p.29; 2, p.70; 3, p.78—79]. But in general, before the war it was limited to only commercial exploration of these areas.

After the end of the war in the Arctic exploration work in Svalbard continued. Under the leadership of the Murmansk commercial association "Murmanryba" in 1945 there were "conducted search operations on the Lofoten Islands in the west of Novaya Zemlya and the east of Spitsbergen, Edge, Nadezhda, Perseus hill and to the edge of the polar ice cap in the north" [2, p. 91]. But it was difficult. The former head of the Association “Sevryba" M.I. Kargin writes: "It was not immediately come to understand that in order to effectively address the problems associated with the daily search for raw materials," Promrazvedka "should be the research and fishing fleet, specially trained should be equipped with the most modern devices, with its own staff of researchers and specially trained crews "[4, p. 30—31]. At first, the fishing fleets worked together with the PINRO expeditions. Expeditions on ships “Rynda” and “Kashalot” confirmed the commercial stocks clusters of the “Polar crease” and proved the possibility of a successful fishing.

In 1946, the Polar Institute of Fisheries and Oceanography (PINRO) identified and justified the new fishing areas for Murmansk fishing fleet outside the Soviet sector of the Western Arctic. There were some opportunities for cod fishing Bear-Spitsbergen shallow water identified. In 1947, these studies continued by 4 loggers. They caught 170 t. of herring [2, p.96]. In 1946—1949 the world's first drift-net fishing vessels “Kashalot”, “Rynda”, "Scout 1", "Scout 2," "Harley", "Smerch" proved the possibility of a successful fishing in areas of Spitsbergen and Medvezhiy.

The work of scientists in these expeditions took place in difficult conditions. Some details could be seen from the letter of Y.Y. Marti written in 1950, during the Spitsbergen expedition, sent from the fishing area to the PINRO Director I. I. Lagunov: "I take the opportunity; the tow is going to Murmansk. Basically I want to share. The expedition is fine, but could be better. Miss a lot in training, and in the course of fishing. Without this, apparently, it is difficult. As the result, for the first time there is a satisfactory prepared good ships and captains starts to get more and more positive side, which seemed to be a problem before. The density of clusters is very high ... But with the development of new technology it is bad.... Have not enough of sleeping and work in intolerable environment. Tightness, noise, etc ... Technique in order, but the situation with work is terrible. I imagine working without a laboratory complex, but did not think it would be so hard.... All of our three assistants have seasickness — it exacerbates the job.” But the tone of the letter was optimistic. The emphasis is on business conclusions: "All the work in the North Atlantic is drawn to me in a very large plane. It was a big problem. The cause must be taken in earnest, almost from scratch, on the basis of oceanographic, or throw and go to do a quiet work. Now it is indisputable for me that the ships should be built only in Murmansk. Type MFT by Sapanadze or Semenov is better than the German ships. All the challenges we are facing cannot be solved without vessels. This is what you need to start from”5.

Truly heroic work of scientists and fishermen still did not get a decent score. A number of employees of the PINRO headed Y. Y. Marti was awarded the State Prize for these studies [2, c.95]. Also, B. Mayntfel, S. Mihaylov, G. Korolkov were awarded the State Prize "for the discovery and development of new herring fishing area in the Barents Sea" [3, c.79].

But in 1946—1947 the exploration expeditions did not get any further continuation. It can be partly explained by the fact that Moscow did not want to cause additional anxiety in the Scandinavian side of their activity near their territorial waters, still hoping for a favorable development of Soviet-Norwegian contacts. But after 1947 the Storting took a cautious stance against the Soviet proposals on Spitsbergen and the situation had changed. Moscow could not help to react to the discussion held in February 1949 in Washington by the US, Canada and Western Union on the establishment of the North Atlantic Pact and its approval in March of the same year. In these conditions it was logical to show an interest in maintaining the stability of the Soviet Union in the North Atlantic. It could be demonstrated by the presence of the Soviet fishing fleet in the area of the oceans. Thus the economy is closely connected with geopolitics.

In 1948, the exploratory expedition of the Soviet fishing fleet to the shores of Iceland was organized in order to determine the capacity of the industrial production of herring. It was carried out by the forces of “Baltgosrybtrest”, participated in this expedition and it had transferred several fishing vessels of the "Murmanryba"6. At the same time in the waters of Svalbard PINRO scientists continued the research in order to identify the opportunities for fish stocks and fishing. Based on the results of these expeditions, the Ministry of Fishing Industry of the USSR, decided to "take into account the existing experience of the North-Atlantic herring expedition, conducted in 1948, as well as the positive results of research in the area of Spitsbergen," organized in 1949 by two fishing expeditions — one to the coast of Iceland, another — to Svalbard. But, judging by some of the documents "Murmanryba", if sending ships to Spitsbergen was included in the annual plan of association, the decision on the allocation of fishing vessels in Icelandic expedition was made after the drawing up the plan for 19497.

In "Basic indicators of the project on the production plan in 1949 for the association “Murmanryba” it was planned to send 4 fishing vessels to the shores of Spitsbergen (2 MFT and 2 SFT). It was planned to give them the 4,250 production plan for herring. That year the ships covered a large area, reaching 78º north and the Lofoten Islands to the west8. Actively conducted exploration on Svalbard was continued. But, as the events in the fishery had shown, it was not enough, especially in the Svalbard area.

Preparations for the expedition began relatively late, and they had to do a lot of work. The order on expeditions was signed on March 12, 1949. Based on archival documents, the preparation began earlier. The order of the “Minrybprom” was determined by the specific terms, indicators and measures that were necessary for the completion and insurance the success of the expedition. Organization of expeditions was taken under special control by the Ministry. In March 1949 in Moscow there was a meeting chaired by the deputy Minister of fishing industry A. Sbrodov, which discussed the “unsatisfactory progress in the preparation of the fleet" and measures to accelerate the preparation of the expedition. On March 31, 1949 there was the next meeting and a decree “On the state of preparation and carrying the North Atlantic herring expeditions in the North of Iceland and Spitsbergen in 1949”. The tone and content of the order recorded in it made it possible to judge these expeditions were extremely important. Some paragraphs of the Order were designated "top secret"⁹. The Order consisted of a set of deadlines for the implementation of all activities —on June 1 the expedition had to go from Kaliningrad to Iceland, and in two weeks — from Murmansk to Spitsbergen. Repair works and conversion of ships had to be carried out in an extraordinary manner and be fully completed by May 20. Materials allocated for these works were forbidden to use for other purposes. Here's a part of the order on ship repairing: “Chief of the “Glavrybsnab” comrade Rovensky together with the deputy chief of the “Glavsevrybprom” comrade Sheredeka within three days (my emphasis.— A.P.) must clarify all the issues of logistics of the Murmansk shipyard in order to complete the tasks necessary for the expedition ship repairing and report about the results to the Deputy Minister Comrade Obukhov"¹⁰. It should be stressed that all the vessels were to be equipped with radios and phones.

Team making should be conducted under the personal supervision of the management the “Glavsevrybprom”. It should be done within five days and it was necessary to send the teams to receive seiners, and together with the Central Office of the Navy it was important to conduct the necessary tests of the equipment. The chief of the “Glavsevrybprom” comrade Skornjakov in accordance with the Order of the “Minrybprom” on March 12, 1949, №120 it was necessary to «complete the equipping of vessels chosen for the expedition, not later than April 15, so that by May 1, the teams would be properly documented and would have nautical books; the registration of workers, handlers and the rest had to be finished by May 1, 1949”. Lack of the qualified personnel made it almost impossible to comply with such instructions in such a short time. On the April, 1 two scientists from VNIRO were sent for three weeks to manage the construction of new gear in Kaliningrad. The same institution was instructed to provide the stuff for the completely new fishing areas and by May 1, a group of scientists continued the research in the fishing area. Deadline May 1 was repeated several times in the Order and it was not accidental. In order to improve the training of personnel it was ordered to release fishing vessels that go on an expedition on the fishing for practical work on the training of fishing crews for expeditions on technique of herring fishery from. It had to be done in period from May 1 to June 1, 1949. “Education in Kaliningrad was held under the leadership of Deputy Chief of the expedition Comrade Wagner, and in Murmansk — under the leadership of Leader of the expedition comrade Sidorenko”11.

The Deputy Chief of “Glavsevrybprom” was asked to report to the Ministry of Fisheries on the progress of all works at least once in five days. In order to do this the leaders had to inform the Deputy Minister about the situation. Such tight control over all matters was not unusual in those years. Detail preparatory work before going out to the sea was made, but still under the control of the Ministry means that these expeditions were given not only economic, but also political significance. It was necessary not only to identify the economic presence in the waters of the potential participants of NATO, but also to do everything to make these expeditions economically beneficial. 27 vessels had to go to Iceland. The ships of Spitsbergen’s expedition were written in the report on the economic activity of the association “Murmanryba” for 1949 and it was said that it was planned to use 12 vessels, including 5MFT, 4 SFT and 3 seiners, but 4 MFT which were sent to the Icelandic expedition and were replaced by 4 motorboats “elongated whale”12. As a result, the expedition got the MFT “Dolphin”, SFT “Smerch”, “Weida” and “Harlov” (but “Harlov” was forced to return to Murmansk because of the leak and was not involved in the expedition), motorboats “Yaz”, “Azimuth”, “Reef” and “Albatross” and “Tambov” and SFT of PINRO. In addition to the ships' crews, 13 different specialists joined the expedition to the shores of Spitsbergen (head of the expedition, his deputy and assistant for political affairs, mining engineer, chief engineer, a senior radio engineer, cryptographer, three scientists, etc.).

The structure of the Icelandic expedition included a similar specialists and two accountants, translator and radio operators with the knowledge of a foreign language — only 22 people. The ships went to Iceland, had to get a result of 25.2 thousand centners of fish, the ships went to Spitsbergen — 10.0 thousand centners13. But the plan of the Spitsbergen expedition was carried out by only 46.2%, or 4.62 thousand centners of herring. “Murmanryba” leaders explained this result: "the failure herring production plan for both vessels and the whole expedition had happened for the following reasons:

• 1.    Incomplete participation of fishing vessels in the expedition.

• 2.    The untimely departure of vessels to fish because of the delay in repairing and the preparations for the expedition.

• 3.    Severe weather conditions in the fishery areas on Svalbard for a small fishing fleet did not allow the sufficient use of the fishing base.

• 4.    The fishing fleet was engaged in a search operation itself on herring.

• 5.    Premature withdrawal from fishing due to storms and lack of concentration herring¹⁴.

However, the PINRO experts put forward another explanation of failures. In 1950, the Academic Council of the PINRO noted that this occurred because of Association “Murmanryba” leaders and the underestimating the value of herring fishery creation in the North. In 1948, the ships were not sent to the North, and in 1949, due to the poor organization and preparation of the expedition ships, the fishing was frustrated.

All this was taken into account in future. And the expedition to the shores of Iceland and Svalbard had stopped carrying out the experiments and began to enter an integral part of the plans of fishing fleets. So, in the plans for 1950 it was clearly stated that, in order to further the elimination of seasonal trawling the most of new areas: the northern and western coast of Norway, Spitsbergen, Medvezhiy Island, Nadezhda Island, Zyuydkapsky chute, the Central Hills and the North Novozemelskoe shallow water15.

Due to the growing importance of herring fishing in the Atlantic on April 26, 1949 the Council of Ministers ordered the creation of a specialized management “Murmanseld” in the

“Murmanryba". The Charter of the companies of a new management was approved on July 19 of that year. The Chapter had determined that it was created “in order to develop an active herring fishery in the Pechenga Bay, Kola Peninsula, Barents Sea, Svalbard Islands and base the herring expedition aimed to fish near Iceland, for buying, processing and marketing of herring and other fish resources of these areas, as well as for the operation of all kinds of plots to fisheries enterprises”16.

But the organizational process had been delayed. Although an Order was published by the association “Murmanryba” on December 3, 1949 to create management and the company became officially operational only since the 1st of January 1950 [2, p.99]. The “Murmanseld” leaders explained the reasons of the delay by a large number of repairs on ships and by the fact that “the majority of organizations associated with the management of “Murmanseld” revealed the neglect toward it. All demands of the “Murmanseld” remained unsupported ... It took the intervention of the most energetic leadership association to rectify the situation”17.

On October 29, 1949 the head of the association “Murmanryba” had a meeting with the Deputy Minister of Fishery of the USSR K.E. Babayan. The preparations for the North Atlantic expedition in 1950 were discussed there. It was planned to send 12 MFT ships with a load of 2,670 c. to the shores of Iceland and give them the fishing plan of 32 thousand centners and to send 8 MFT to Svalbard with a load of 1,000 c. and the fishing plan of 8 thousand centners. But soon the scales of the expedition were increased. By December 8, 1949 the chief engineer of the “Murmanryba” got about 25 vessels for the Icelandic expedition and 15 for Spitsbergen expedition. But on December 14th the Deputy Head of the association “Murmanryba” sent a letter to the leaders of the newly created “Murmanseld” management unit saying about 28 ships intended to be sent to Iceland, and 19 — to Shpitsbergen. All the exploration of the fishing resources during the expeditions was the responsibility of the PINRO. Four of its employees (the chief of the expedition Y.Y. Marti, hydrologist B.V. Istoshin, hydrophone A.A. Gankov, intern-hydrophone A.A. Degtyarev) went to the open sea on the flagship of the expedition —MFT “Groza”. During the first 9 months of the year 1950 the expedition examined 22 areas for commercial fishing near the Western Spitsbergen18.

It was harder than expected to organize the North Atlantic expedition. The scale of this expedition was much wider than that of the past. The newly created “Murmanseld” unit faced a complex problem. Firstly , there was a problem with the schedule for the ships coming from the

other fleets: By the January 1, it had to be 38 ships there, but, in fact, they had only 10. Secondly , all the arriving ships were not designed for trawling — they were a new the type of vessels where the trawl fishing had not been performed. Thirdly , the ships had no radio and failed to meet the requirements of the USSR Register of the ships operating in polar latitudes. In 1950 due to the fact that the needs of “Murmanseld” in supply were not taken into account and, in fact, they were unplanned, it had become difficult to organize anything due to lack of materials and equipment. They had to do a great job reequip the ships. Fourthly , there were problems with the personnel of the expeditions. The personnel of these vessels had no experience in trawling and were not familiar with the types of trawls, trawling equipment and new fishing areas. It had to be learnt in the course of fishing in the open sea. The leaders of the ”Murmanseldi” wrote the explanatory note to the annual report highlight that that year the staff of the expedition had not been equipped with a woolen clothes (warm underwear, sweaters, scarves, mittens, knitted hats, etc.), as well as the “Murmrybsnab” did not provide them with these items. It is difficult to imagine the conditions of fishermen’s work in the polar expeditions without the required amount of warm clothing. The documents have no information on how they managed to solve this problem¹⁹.

The routine tasks precisely designated the date when all ships had to go to the sea: Icelandic expedition — on the 15th of May, 1950, Svalbard — on the 25th of May. But the timing could not be maintained, though all the work was done in time. The vessels of the Spitsbergen expedition went out to sea in small groups of 1—6 ships. During the June 1950 there were 26 fishing vessels in the open sea. The other 9 vessels had not arrived. The “Murmanseld” leaders believed that they “could not agree with the stretching out of the expedition start up to a month. It should have been taken no more than 5—8 days”20.

During the first 9 months of 1950 the “Murmanryba’s” ships got 11,700 centners of fish in the area of Spitsbergen. But it was only 0.07% of the total fish caught by the “Murmanryba”. The fact that there was a small amount of floating factories had the impact on the catch. The floating factories of the expedition could not take the entire amount of the catch. As it was noted by the leaders of the “Murmanseld”, “the ships of the Spitsbergen expedition lost 350 days on the delivery of herring. If there were more floating factories the amount of the catch could go up for not less than 25.0 thousand centners of herring.” And even in hard circumstances, the plan had been exceeded: the catch for each MFT was averaged by 219.7% of the planned (during the Icelandic expedition — 132%). The difficulty with filling the vessels with fuel and water in the

fishing area had the impact on the expeditions. Converted into a tanker the marine vessel for fishing “Shalim”, responsible for the fueling the ships of the Spitsbergen expedition, did not meet the requirements of the Register of the USSR and had a small tonnage. There was a need in a tanker with a capacity of not less than 500 tons. A serious problem was indicated in connection with the poor quality of coal. Because of that “10.6 days were lost at sea for raising the steam”21.

In order to remove this tension the leaders of the “Murmanryba” offered the creation of the bases to provide the trawlers with the coal and water in remote areas: on Novaya Zemlya in the Bay Belushi, on Spitsbergen in Barentsburg and in the Iokange on the Murmansk coast. These proposals didn’t meet any objections, but nothing was done to implement them. Analyzing the herring expeditions of the past, the scientists from the PINRO pointed out that the conditions of herring fishing off the coast of Spitsbergen were more difficult than that near the Iceland. In their view, that situation made it necessary to organize well supplied exploration. Otherwise the ships would be doomed to reducing of productivity and to a large number of useless drifts. In 1950, due to the quite satisfactory exploration there were 40% of empty drifts. The PINRO Academic Council paid a special attention to the need for the industry in scientific research of the area of the northern latitudes and in organization of well-equipped and seriously operated management system of the sea fleet22.

The organization of commercial exploration faced may problems in 1950. In the Order of the Minister of Fishery of the USSR K. Rusakov it was noted that the exploration of the fish was done with the help of ships with a small radius of sailing, and their technical equipment got no proper attention. Some vessels were poorly equipped, had no sonar electro winches. In 1950 the repayment of the search seiners was done with a delay. The leaders of the trawler fleet did not take appropriate measures to provide the ships with the experienced staff. The trawlers had constant command staff turnover, which had an extremely negative impact on the results of their work. The attention was paid to the inadequate training of commanders and fishing crews for work in conditions of the North Atlantic. There were serious complaints from fishermen and scientists to: projections that were given and specialists by PINRO and VNIRO23. And still at large, despite all the mistakes, the organization of herring expeditions and their results in 1950 should be considered as satisfactory.

The plans for the USSR Ministry of Defense for 1951 provided the organization of the herring expeditions to the shores of Iceland and Svalbard. Preparations were conducted under a

special control of the part of management of the fleets and by the Ministry itself. In Order to “Murmanryba” “On measures to ensure the implementation of the plan in 1951 for the association “Murmanryba” on April 7, 1951 contained the detail description of all vessels of the expedition, the plan and the measures to ensure timely access to the sea. Thus the rate of supply was scheduled for six months. Description of the equipment and other types of supply were enclosed.

On the 29th of May 1951 the USSR ministry of fisheries issued an Order №354 “On herring expeditions 1951”, where “Glavsevrybprom” (comrade Kulikov), association “Murmanryba” (comrade Sapanadze), “Baltic gosrybtrest” (comrade Sidorenko), “Minrybprom” of the Karelian — Finnish SSR (comrade Melentev) and “Minrybprom” of the Lithuanian SSR (comrade Mitskyavichus) were ordered to prepare and send the herring expedition to the North Atlantic, the island of Svalbard and the North Sea24...The ships had to be sent to the sea on the 1st of June 1951, all the materials and supply for the ships of the expedition, according to the attached list had to be ready by this day. It was not possible to do in two days that were left before the expedition start. It is clear that the work on the preparation of ships was conducted much earlier. In the list of activities to ensure the date of the expedition start, it was stated — “during May—October” and “since the 15th of May”. We are talking about activities that had been done already. All written above means that theUSSR Ministry of Fisheries order was a document that summarized the final outcome of the work on the organization of expeditions that had begun much earlier. The document reveals a strong control of these expeditions done by the Ministry.

Next month by the request of the Deputy Minister of Fisheries K.E. Babayan the information on the implementation of the Orders of the Ministry by the June 16th was provided. The detailed information was given on the implementation of each paragraph of the Order of 29th of May. In spite of the controls, the organization of expeditions was rather bad. Developing the plan for 1951 the “Glavsevrybprom” supposed to send 19 trawlers to Spitsbergen and 30—to Iceland. But then it was decided to send a much larger number of vessels. According to the Order of “Minrybprom”, 85 MFT ships (including 4 exploration vessels), 2 SO seiner type ships, the floating base “Academician Pavlov” and “Onega”, lighters “Nokuev”, “Medvezhiy” and “Onega”, tugboats “Murmanryba”, “Hercules” and “Skoriy”, 5 schooners and 5 more MFT vessels of “Minrybprom” of the Lithuanian SSR25 were supposed to go to the coast of Spitsbergen. But some of them could not even go to the sea in the middle of June because of a delay with their repair. The floating base ship “Academician

Pavlov” arrived in Murmansk only on June 13th and was in need of repair. The floating base “Onega” and “Tambov” went to the sea instead.

The vessels of Svalbard and Iceland expeditions got the most modern equipment. The ships had 60 echo-sounder with recorders, 60 finders, 89 stations (TSA and PARKS-008). The equipment of the research vessels was under the special control. In the Order of the Minister of Fisheries of the USSR Rusakov on 12 February 1951 it was especially highlighted: “All search vessels are equipped with modern special equipment to explore the fish”. A staffing list got the position of the deputy head of the expedition on exploration. But still it was impossible to achieve the desired targets. The head of the Association “Murmanryba” evaluated the results of the year 1951 and highlighted the “inadequate operational work of the exploratory fleet”26.

The organizers were unable to provide the necessary number of nets: the factories could not cope with the task. Among the 23,400 required nets 6,500 were lacking (including exploration drifts). Missing nets were delivered to the area by the transport vessels in the course of the expedition. There was a lack of 56,000 barrels for the caught fish27. The ministry ordered to provide the expedition with them but their delivery from Astrakhan and Arkhangelsk was delayed. Among the other measures addressed to the problems identified by the Ministry was the creation of new capacity for the production of packaging in Murmansk. There was a difficult situation with the fuel, especially diesel. Despite the orders of the Ministry, the delivery was not done in time.

There were difficulties with staff. There was an Order to provide the expedition with “sailors and fishermen” by the 10th of June. But it failed. “Because of the lack of staff the provision of the expedition with the command staff was delayed. This is the reason for the delay of the expedition start”28. 27 graduates of the “Kaspglavrybprom” training center in Arkhangelsk could not arrive at the appointed time. The situation was difficult. It was not easy to complete the training of specialists for the herring fishery, because the remote areas of the North Atlantic differed from the conditions of the Murman coast. The lack of experts made it impossible to send an expedition with 8 gripmaster instructors as it was required. They were able to send only 3. In order to improve the level of training of the members of expeditions the Order to the “Murmanryba” it was said that it was needed to agree with the leadership training-course company to make short courses on technology of herring fishing for 50 captains and 50 gripmasters before the expedition start. It was planned to invite experienced captains and trapmaster, as well as the PINRO employees. There was also a lack of ordinary personnel. Some

efforts were made to get workers from other regions of the country. “Senior officials of “Murmanseld” and “Murmanryba” were sent to organize the recruitment of sailors and people demobilized from the BMF in other regions”29. However, the turnover of crew remained very high. It was necessary to find a way out acting on the situation.

Most of the problems were solved on the spot. The Head of the Association “Murmanryba” P.V. Sapanadze reported to the Ministry that he had difficulties with the supply of the expedition with selected materials, but every problem was solved immediately by the means of the centralized system and local resources. Great attention was paid to the fishermen’s supplies: the necessary clothing and other items important in polar conditions. The annex to the Order of the Ministry contained a detailed list of everything the fishermen needed. Fishermen should have received a “in addition to the funds for the year 1951 the additional vessels participating in the North Atlantic herring and Spitsbergen expeditions, should had been provided with 150 coats, 1,080 sets of cotton suits, 1710 pairs of boots by the 1st of June 195130.

The organizers herring of the expeditions did not forget such an important matter of that time as the socialist competition. In the Order for the association “Murmanryba” on the 7th of April 1951 it was said: “To organize a socialist competition between the ship of the North-Atlantic group of Kaliningrad vessels and herring Spitsbergen expedition” of the “Murmanseld” "for the early implementation of the plan of herring fishing in 1951”. But, summarizing the work of “Murmanseld” in 1951, the head of the Association “Murmanryba” P.V. Sapanadze admitted "the absence of the prober struggle for the safety of nets and other equipment and little work on dissemination and transfer of progressive knowledge”31.

The leaders of the “Minrybprom” required the ships returning from Iceland and Svalbard expeditions to be handled at the port in five days. The certificate directed to the Deputy Minister of Fisheries K.E. Babayan noted that there were no delays in processing of the expedition ships in the port32. But in general, the discrepancy between the capacity of the floating factories and fishing opportunities of the fleet affected very badly. Due to the fact that the floating factories were not able to provide timely acceptance of fish, “in a period of intense fishing many fishing vessels were removed from the fishing areas and sent to the port or lost a lot of time waiting in the queue near the floating factories”33.

The catch of herring during the expeditions was determined as follows: the expedition to the North Atlantic — 107,000 c., the expedition to Spitsbergen area — 214,000 c. The average of the fish catch per fishing MFT was established for the North Atlantic expedition — 2,500 c., and the on Svalbard a) for the 51 MFT ships under the plan in 1,951 and floating factories — 2,740 c, b) for the 35 MFT new ships with second priority based in port — 2,000 c. These were so high expectations. In the previous year, the plan was 2,000 c. per ship. In 1951, the catch of herring compared to the year 1950 increased by almost 4 times34.

Evaluating the results of the first expeditions, the head of the association “Murmanryba” P.V. Sapanadze said: "A new fishing area with great natural resources was opened; the herring fishery period was considerably extended; experience in technology and organization of the herring fishery was accumulated; new, advanced methods of work were developed; navigators, mechanics and drift masters were trained”35.

Until 1952, the fishing in the North Atlantic done by the Soviet fishermen was seasonal: the vessels went out in May, and got back by September. In 1952 new task to organize the winter herring in Spitsbergen and Iceland was given. This meant that the fishermen had to do the all yearround fishing. Special attention was paid to the organization of commercial fishing. It was the topic of the special Order of the Head of the Association “Murmanryba” P.V Sapanadze on the 7th of January 1952 “On holding a commercial fishing to ensure winter fishing of herring in the North Atlantic” which stated: "1. Head of the “Murmanseld” Comrade. Dugladze I.I.: let the PINRO use the MFT-M-1 ship “Korablestroitel”, for prospective commercial fishing for the entire period of work in 1952.... 4. PINRO Scientist sent to the MFT-M-1 ship “Korablestroitel”, should be provided with free meals, clothes on a par with the crew.... 6. The expedition start for the MFT-M-1 ship “Korablestroitel” is set for January 8, 1952”36.

According to the Order of the “Minrybprom”, 95 MFT ships (4 of them were for exploration of the fishing areas), as well as 13 support vessels (including 9 floating factories) and 5 seiners for the development of herring by purse seines had to be sent to the Spitsbergen area. 81 ship, including 4 search MFT ships and 3 floating base were sent to the Iceland. The floating factory “In Memory of Lenin”, directed to Spitsbergen, was equipped with runways, helicopter landing pad for aerial surveys of herring in the open sea. Two groups of researchers from VNIRO and PINRO were sent to carry out research work at two MFT ships specially designated for that. In previous years, during the fishery in the North Atlantic area fishing vessels often lost time due to the poor quality of weather forecasts. In this regard, in 1952, two operational groups (3 persons) of professionals from the Main Department of Hydrometeorology under the USSR Council of Ministers were sent on to the sea expeditions on the floating factories “In Memory of Lenin” and “Tungus” to serve herring expeditions. At the same time the command of the expedition was required to provide the “normal conditions for their work”37. But in general the preparation for expeditions to Spitsbergen and to the shores of Iceland was unsatisfactory. It was noted in a special Order of the Ministry of Fisheries of the USSR on May 26, 1952: “As a result of not enough clear guidance and control over the preparation of the herring expeditions by “Glavsevrybprom” and departments of the Ministry, the preparation of the expedition to the North Atlantic goes poorly, which could lead to untimely start of fishing”38.

In the course of the past herring expeditions in the 1949—1951 there were serious violations of the fish processing technology, which led to a decrease in product quality. Usually it happened due to reasons beyond the control of the fishermen. In general, these reasons were related to poor-quality packaging and a lack of the necessary components for salting fish (so, for example, the sea water was used instead of fresh for the preparation of brine, which is filled with fish in barrels). Therefore, in 1952 the Order of the Minister of Fisheries of the USSR D. Pavlova consists of a rigid requirement of a sharp improvement in processing technology of the Atlantic herring and improving the quality of products39. Given the experience of previous years, this year's fishing vessels left only in groups. In addition, each group was given a flagship and instructions on jointly sailing. This practice had helped to improve the work of fishermen. In previous years, a discrepancy between the possibilities of producing and capacity of the fishing fleet had revealed. In 1952 the expeditions were given significantly more floating factories than the previous ones. But because of the severe storms floating factories could not take fish from vessels in the open ocean and had to return from to the port with an underload. In connection with this, a part of the trawlers was forced to stop fishing and go to the port to pass fish. Like in previous years, there were complaints about the commercial fishing. The herring fishing vessels could not be good enough to provide the fishing fleet with the resource base, to consider of experience of the previous expeditions and, in some cases, they were just holding about a group of fishing vessels damaging the exploration work40. In 1952 it was decided to improve the work of the fishermen and

all fishing MFT ships had become self-financing. The amount of herring caught during the expeditions in 1952 was 418,241 c41.

Conclusion

Summarizing the results of the herring expeditions of this period, the leaders of the “Glavmurmanrybprom” noted that sailors of the herring expeditions were mastering herring fishery at great depths up to 120 meters with the drift nets and thus proved the possibility of economic expediency and a full year-round herring fishery in the North Atlantic42.

Positive evaluation was given to the herring fishery in the North-East Atlantic in a few publications devoted to the study of this period in the history of domestic fisheries. V.K. Zilanov wrote: “In 1950s—1970s of the Medvezhiy—Spitsbergen area got a great importance for the domestic fisheries as a fishing area for, first of all, bottom fish — cod, perch, halibut, catfish, capelin and shrimp. This region is the leading one for the home fishery because of the cooling of the eastern part of the Barents Sea” [3, c.79].

According to M.I. Kargin, that fishing area had become extremely important because in mid-1960s “herring fishing in the North-East Atlantic went to a close under the influence of unregulated international fisheries” [4, c.66].

Of course, fishing in the North Atlantic, and especially in the area of Spitsbergen had a great economic importance for our country. Herring expeditions largely contributed to solving the food difficulties of the postwar years. The problems involved and the difficulties occurred but largely they had the organizational background and had been associated with quality control, insufficient use of more advanced technology for commercial fishing, fish processing quality. Deficiencies in supplies and equipment, lack of necessary resources constantly affected the timing of implementation of tasks.

Development of domestic fisheries in the area was also a great geopolitical value. This is confirmed by the increased attention paid to the fishery from the side of the leaders of the fishing industry. Active work of Soviet fishermen in the North Atlantic, and in particular off the coast of Spitsbergen and Iceland, provided the Soviet presence in strategically important areas of the world's oceans considered by NATO as its area of responsibility. The activities of fishing vessels showed an interest of the USSR in maintaining the stability of these areas in terms of the Cold War.