21. II. 1921

Comrade Gorbunov!

Martens, our former representative in America, is here.
We must help him. See him today. Find him at the "Lux" Hotel
through my telephone operators.
1) Electrical engineering textbooks for Goelro.
Get in touch with Krzhizhanovsky.
2) Regarding the American workers (in Russia) with Anikst.¹,
3) Regarding a trip to factories and plants
{? Through Rykov to find }
{? with whom to arrange this }
4) Regarding groups of technical assistance to us in America
(with the NTO²?
or else with the Supreme Economic Council
and the People's Commissariat for Foreign Trade?
we must find with whom to arrange this)
5) Resettlement from America to us of various individuals and groups (very cautiously. Is there a commission on this question?).

Lenin

¹ In 1921, separate groups of American workers expressed a desire to come to Soviet Russia and take part in its economic restoration. A significant part of these workers were Russian emigrants who had left for America before the October Revolution. The workers wishing to go to Russia grouped around the "Society for Technical Assistance to Soviet Russia" created in the USA. The question of the possibility of American workers coming to Soviet Russia was raised before the Soviet government by L. K. Martens. A. M. Anikst was a member of the board of the People's Commissariat for Labour.
² Scientific-Technical Department of the Supreme Economic Council.

Source: Lenin Miscellany XXXVI, pp. 199–200.