to open next chapter. - NASA's History Office

On the Times and My Contemporaries
Belousov, the former Minister of Shipbuilding. During the last phase of this
complex period for our defense industry, the Commission was headed once again
by Maslyukov. The Commission was liquidated in December 1991 after the
collapse of the Soviet Union.
Traditionally, the Military-Industrial Commission oversaw nine ministries,
which corresponded to nine key industries: nuclear (MSM 19 ); aviation (MAP 20 );
rocket-space (MOM 21 ); shipbuilding (MSP 22 ); radio engineering (MRP 23 ); electronics
(MEP 24 ); defense (MOP 25 ); communications equipment (MPSS 26 ); and machinebuilding
(for munitions, MM 27 ).
According to data that Oleg Dmitryevich Baklanov cites in a yet-to-bepublished
work, by the late 1970s, the military industry, i.e., what we refer to as
the military-industrial complex, was concentrated into 1,770 enterprises under
these nine main ministries, of which 450 were scientific research organizations and
250 experimental-design organizations. A total of 10.45 million individuals
worked in the industry.
In addition, another approximately 546,000 persons were involved in civilian
industries associated with the military-industrial complex (chemical, electrical,
textile, automobile, etc.). In all, in spite of the Cold War, no more than approximately
10 percent of the scientific-technical and industrial potential of the USSR
was working in the interests of the military-industrial complex. This is approximately
12 million persons, or around 30 million persons when counting family
members.This figure does not count the industrial and construction organizations
of the Ministry of Defense, which did not formally enter into the “Big Nine” of
the military-industrial complex.
From the total number of industry personnel involved in defense production,
33.7 percent worked in aerospace; 20.3 percent worked in radio engineering, electronics,
and communications; and 9.1 percent worked in shipbuilding. Meanwhile,
the military-industrial complex contributed more than 20 percent of the volume
of the gross nation product. Thus, rocket technology and cosmonautics were far
from being the only concern of the Commission on Military-Industrial Issues.
it would be a simplification to suggest that the rapid development of rocketspace
technology during the period of the progressive mobilization economy was
a process devoid of conflict. Not only were there confrontations between design
19. MSM—Ministerstvo srednego mashinostroyeniya (Ministry of Medium Machine-Building).
20. MAP—Ministerstvo aviatsionnoy promyshlennosti (Ministry of Aviation Industry).
21. MOM—Ministerstvo obshchego mashinostroyeniya (Ministry of General Machine-Building).
22. MSP—Ministerstvo sudostroitelnoy promyshlennosti (Ministry of Shipbuilding Industry).
23. MRP—Ministerstvo radio promyshlennosti (Ministry of Radio Industry).
24. MEP—Ministerstvi elektronnoy promyshlennosti (Ministry of Electronics Industry).
25. MOP—Ministerstvo oboronnoy promyshlennosti (Ministry of Defense Industry).
26. MPSS—Ministerstvo promyshlennosti sredstv svyazi (Ministry of Communications Equipment Industry).
27. MM—Ministerstvo mashinostroyeniya (Ministry of Machine-Building).
23