V. I.

Lenin

436

To:   V. V. KUIBYSHEV [1]

12.X.1921

Comrade Kuibyshev:

Please let me have the following additional explanations
on the Rutgers case:

1) everyone seems to think we shall have to spend 300,000
dollars.

But § 4 a) says:

“ The Soviet Government shall allocate 100 dollars for each worker coming to settle ”,
while § 5 a) and b) say that 2,800+3,000=5,800 are due to settle.

Doesn’t that make our expenditure 600,000 dollars?

Or should we add clearly: 100 dollars each for 3,000 men
for the Nadezhdinsk Works and nothing more?

2) Why is there no written statement from all three,
Rutgers, Heywood and Calvert, that they are willing to sign the enclosed “undertaking”?

Please order this today and be sure to have it done in English .

3) End of § 8 (our pledge to repay expenses) should be
set out more precisely in a special §: “The Soviet
Government undertakes to reimburse expenses only on the
following principles and in the following cases.”

4) Is there any sign of an ultimatum in the amendments
made by Rutgers and the others to the text adopted by the
Supreme Economic Council Presidium?

Please send me your reply (+the English pledge) and return this letter to Molotov , C.C. Secretary, tomorrow, Thursday, October 13 .

With communist greetings, Lenin

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Notes:
[1]
Lenin’s remarks refer to the draft “Basic Propositions for a C.L.D.

Agreement with the Rutgers Group”, which the S.E.C. Presidium approved on October 10, 1921.

“ The undertaking ”, a draft engagement concerning the terms on which the American workers were to travel to and work in

Soviet Russia, which Lenin drew up on September 22, 1921 (see present edition, Vol. 42, pp. 344–45).