Editing Eastern Bloc (section)

===Initial changes===

====Transformations billed as reforms====
[[File:Vilnius Energy and Technology Museum 48.JPG|thumb|left|Reconstruction of a typical [[Proletariat|working class]] flat interior in a [[khrushchyovka]]]]
In the USSR, because of strict Soviet secrecy under [[Joseph Stalin]], for many years after World War II, even the best informed foreigners did not effectively know about the operations of the Soviet economy.<ref name="laqueur23">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Laqueur|1994|p=23}}</ref> Stalin had sealed off outside access to the Soviet Union since 1935 (and until his death), effectively permitting no foreign travel inside the Soviet Union such that outsiders did not know of the political processes that had taken place therein.<ref name="laqueur22">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Laqueur|1994|p=22}}</ref> During this period, and even for 25 years after Stalin's death, the few diplomats and foreign correspondents permitted inside the Soviet Union were usually restricted to within a few kilometres of Moscow, their phones were tapped, their residences were restricted to foreigner-only locations and they were constantly followed by Soviet authorities.<ref name="laqueur22"/>

The Soviets also modeled economies in the rest of Eastern Bloc outside the Soviet Union along Soviet [[command economy]] lines.<ref name="turnock23">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Turnock|1997|p=23}}</ref> Before World War II, the Soviet Union used draconian procedures to ensure compliance with directives to invest all assets in state planned manners, including the [[collectivisation]] of agriculture and utilising a sizeable labor army collected in the [[gulag]] system.<ref name="2turnock267"/> This system was largely imposed on other Eastern Bloc countries after World War II.<ref name="2turnock267"/> While propaganda of proletarian improvements accompanied systemic changes, terror and intimidation of the consequent ruthless Stalinism obfuscated feelings of any purported benefits.<ref name="turnock27"/>

Stalin felt that socioeconomic transformation was indispensable to establish Soviet control, reflecting the [[Marxism–Leninism|Marxist–Leninist]] view that material bases, the distribution of the means of production, shaped social and political relations.<ref name="wettig36"/> Moscow trained cadres were put into crucial power positions to fulfill orders regarding sociopolitical transformation.<ref name="wettig36"/> Elimination of the bourgeoisie's social and financial power by expropriation of landed and industrial property was accorded absolute priority.<ref name="wettig37"/>

These measures were publicly billed as reforms rather than socioeconomic transformations.<ref name="wettig37"/> Throughout the Eastern Bloc, except for [[Czechoslovak Socialist Republic|Czechoslovakia]], "societal organisations" such as trade unions and associations representing various social, professional and other groups, were erected with only one organisation for each category, with competition excluded.<ref name="wettig37"/> Those organisations were managed by Stalinist cadres, though during the initial period, they allowed for some diversity.<ref name="wettig38"/>

====Asset relocation====
At the same time, at the war's end, the Soviet Union adopted a "[[plunder]] policy" of physically transporting and relocating east European industrial assets to the Soviet Union.<ref name="pearson29">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Pearson|1998|pp=29–30}}</ref> Eastern Bloc states were required to provide coal, industrial equipment, technology, rolling stock and other resources to reconstruct the Soviet Union.<ref name="bideleux461">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Bideleux|Jeffries|2007|p=461}}</ref> Between 1945 and 1953, the Soviets received a net transfer of resources from the rest of the Eastern Bloc under this policy of roughly $14&nbsp;billion, an amount comparable to the net transfer from the United States to western Europe in the [[Marshall Plan]].<ref name="bideleux461"/><ref name="black86">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Black|English|Helmreich|McAdams|2000|p=86}}</ref> "Reparations" included the dismantling of railways in Poland and Romanian reparations to the Soviets between 1944 and 1948 valued at $1.8&nbsp;billion concurrent with the domination of [[SovRoms]].<ref name="2turnock267"/>

In addition, the Soviets re-organised enterprises as [[Joint-stock company|joint-stock companies]] in which the Soviets possessed the controlling interest.<ref name="black86"/><ref name="crampton211">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Crampton|1997|p=211}}</ref> Using that control vehicle, several enterprises were required to sell products at below world prices to the Soviets, such as uranium mines in [[Czechoslovak Socialist Republic|Czechoslovakia]] and [[East Germany]], coal mines in [[People's Republic of Poland|Poland]], and oil wells in [[People's Republic of Romania|Romania]].<ref name="black87">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Black|English|Helmreich|McAdams|2000|p=87}}</ref>

====Trade and Comecon====
{{Main|Comecon|History of the Comecon}}

The trading pattern of the Eastern Bloc countries was severely modified.<ref name="black88">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Black|English|Helmreich|McAdams|2000|p=88}}</ref> Before World War II, no greater than 1%–2% of those countries' trade was with the Soviet Union.<ref name="black88"/> By 1953, the share of such trade had jumped to 37%.<ref name="black88"/> In 1947, [[Joseph Stalin]] had also denounced the [[Marshall Plan]] and forbade all Eastern Bloc countries from participating in it.<ref name="black82">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Black|English|Helmreich|McAdams|2000|p=82}}</ref>

Soviet dominance further tied other Eastern Bloc economies<ref name="black88"/> to Moscow via the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA) or [[Comecon]], which determined countries' investment allocations and the products that would be traded within Eastern Bloc.<ref name="frucht382"/> Although Comecon was initiated in 1949, its role became ambiguous because Stalin preferred more direct links with other party chiefs than the indirect sophistication of the council. It played no significant role in the 1950s in economic planning.<ref name="turnock26"/>

Initially, Comecon served as cover for the Soviet taking of materials and equipment from the rest of the Eastern Bloc, but the balance changed when the Soviets became net subsidisers of the rest of the Bloc by the 1970s via an exchange of low cost raw materials in return for shoddily manufactured finished goods.<ref name="turnock27"/> While resources such as oil, timber and uranium initially made gaining access to other Eastern Bloc economies attractive, the Soviets soon had to export Soviet raw materials to those countries to maintain cohesion therein.<ref name="2turnock267">{{Harvard citation no brackets|Turnock|2006|p=267}}</ref> Following resistance to Comecon plans to extract [[People's Republic of Romania|Romania]]'s mineral resources and heavily utilise its agricultural production, Romania began to take a more independent stance in 1964.<ref name="crampton313"/> While it did not repudiate Comecon, it took no significant role in its operation, especially after the rise to power of [[Nicolae Ceauşescu]].<ref name="crampton313"/>