THE KIROV SYNTHETIC RUBBER FACTORY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP82-00047R000300200005-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 5, 2013
• Sequence Number: 5
• Publication Date: August 5, 1953
• Content Type: REPORT

1 VIP
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CLASSIFICATION CoNFTDENTIAL/SECIMITYZWELVAIAXION---r�IL
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
INFORMATION REPORT
COUNTRY Upp
SUBJECT Te Kirov Synthetic Rubber Factory (cvoiTi.TviK
itArvit KoMBWHAT ottemw ki,i'Po6A")
TWIN DOCUMENT CONTAINS INFORMATION AFFICTING TNI NATIONAL DIFINSI
OP TNE UNITED STATIN, WITHIN TN, MIANINS OF TITLE 18, SUCTIONS 703
AND 794, OF ?Ng U.S. COOK, 41 AMINDIO, ITI TRANSMISSION OR ItYL.
LOTION OF ITU CONTINTS TO OR RICIIPT NY AN UNAUTHOGISID PRISON II
PRONISITIO ST LAW. ?NI RIPRODUCTIOM or TNIS room ts roomootoso.
CD NO.
DATE DISTR,
NO. OF PAGES
NO. OF ENCLS.
(LISTED BELOVk
SUPPLE4NT T
REPORT NO.
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953
CADkipaqe
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THIS IS UNEVALUATED INFORMATION scal`,
1. The Kirov Synthetic Rubber Factory was begun in 1930 and was the first
factory in the USSR for the piaduction of rubber from the particular raw
materials which were used. Theis materials were calcium oxide, salt,
water, and coal, and the factory was built at Erevan beCtuse all of these
-1Wer141.0. IACOPt eoal,v0eakundaMt4 ava4lab1e irt�the &rex., The coil was
brought from the T,7krane, '140.0iietzUity-iiothir-imitietatit fitter,.
no also plentiful. The factory was an Outgrowth of a small pilot opera-
tion in Leningrad where a negligible amount of synthetic rubber was being
produced of the same materials and by the same proceties eltiblished for-
th', Kyov plant. In 1940, synthetic rubber was being made from alcohol
at SOilet factories in Yaroslavl, Efremov, and Kasan. As of 1942, my last
year in the USSR, the Kirov plant was still the only one of it, kind in
the USSR, except for the Leningrad operation, and I have heard nothing
NEM
CLASSIFICATION CONTIDNNTIAL/SIOURITY INTONATION
DMTMBUTION
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CONFIDENTIAL/SECURITY INFORMATION
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since to indicate the existence of another such synthetic rubber enter-
prise anywhere else in the USSR.
2. From June 1939 to February 1940 I was employed by the plant as a chemical
technician in the carbide department iftee Enclosures(10and(1327 This was
in the non-secret part of the factory, to which I was assigned because of
my failure to receive NKVD clearance for more secret work in synthetic
rubber production. My knowledge of the restricted parts of the plant was
gained from friends who were employed there and from my own observations
which even the special security precautions could not prohibit entirely.
� The plant was producing carbide prior to 1936 and its carbide production
capacity in 1940, according to my personal estimate, was over 100 tons
per day. The acetylene department was developed slowly between the
years 1933 and 1939. When construction of this part of the factory was
begun in 1933, it was expected that synthetic rubber production would
� begin sometime during 1938 or 1939. Actually, there was very little pro-
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pleted and staffed with engineers, technicians, and workers but the bugs
� in the process had not been eliminated by early 1940 and I believe it
was late in 1941 or early in 1942 before any appreciable syntheti rubber
� production was achieved. I would not try to estimate what production was
in early 1940 or what it might have been by mid-1942. There was always
talk of ultimately expanding the operation beyond its 1940 dimensions.
3. The construction of this plant was a political and industrial shaMbles.
I have always felt that the Soviet performance on this project was an
outstanding instance of its kind and contains ,important limns for the
non-Communist world. There was no precedent for the project, leaving out
of account the LeOingraa pilot plant, and. it yam built from new specifica-
tions whi,..h had never before yielded Yup any similar going concern. Ivory
piece of work was 'checked by inspection commissions 'which arrested engin-
eers by the dozen and required everything which deviated in the slightest
degree from the specifications to be torn down and started again. No honest
mistake was ever made during the six years of building and rebuilding this
factory. Approkimately 50% of the professional people associated with
the project during those six years were accused of mabotage, oounter,
revolutionary activity, diversioniem or related crimes; and most of them
spent some time in jail.
The Kirov Synthetic Rubber Factory was under special security measure,
from the first eud was dominated by Russians rather than by Armenians.
It was the only fa6tory in Armenia, to the best of my knowledge, in 'which
Russian and not Armenian was the primary language. All the security
guards were Russians as were most of the workers in the secret sections
of the plant. Most of the engineers were Armenians but it wee clear that
the USSR did not trust security functions to Armenians, nor did it want
large groups of Armenian 'workers in the sensitive areas of the operation.
The first head of the factory was a Russian named 30P1M, a military
academy graduate who had civilian status and wore civilian clothes at
the plant. He was succeeded in 1938 (?) by an Armenian woman, whose name
have forgotten, but who was no more than 40 years old and was a member
of the Armenian Praesidium. The chief engineers of the plant were, as 1
have said, mostly Armenians and they were replaced nearly every year.
I can remember thelnames of none of them.
5. The plant was built for defense against air attack. There were air raid
shelters under every building and each department had an air raid warden
who conducted periodic drills. The shelters were concrete and were reached
by ramps. They were quite deep, judging from my recollection of the grade
of the ramps and the distance one walked to reach the shelters.
CONFIDNNTIAL/SECURITY INFORMATION
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OONFIDENTIAL/SECURITY INFORMATION
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6, The factory employed a total of over five thousand persons on all shifts.
Approximately 25% were women. The women were used as laboratory analysts,
office workers, light laborers in the producing and processing units, and
charwomen. Of the five thousand employees, about 100 were professional
engineers and another 100
The percentage of women in both the professional and technical groups was
roughly the same - 25% - as for the factory personnel as a whole.
7. The employees worked a six-day week with total hours ranging from 36 to 48
depending upon the length of the daily shift which depended, in turn, on
the kind of work performed. Everyone received one week's vacation with
pay each year and no additional unpaid vacation was authorized. The sal-
ary of the professional engineers ranged from 5-900 rubles a month depend-
ing upon the degree of experience and responsibility, and the shift to
which the engineer was assigned,
more experienced technicians with similar.formal training were earning up
to 400 or 450 rubles- u month. The wages of workers varied from a minimum
of 150 to a Maximum of 500 rubles i a month. The men working the six-hour
shifts on the furnaces in the carbide department received 500 rubles; a
month. In general, the women in the. plant in all categories received 25%
lower wages for the same work. So far as I know, there was no wage dif-
ferential on the basis of nationality - ie Russian or Armenian - despite
the over-all pattern of Russian domination of the enterprise, particularly
plant security and the secret acetylene-conversion processes.
8. We were told by plant officials that the factory had been specially
designed for quick conversion toprely military production in wartime.
We were not, however, told what could be produced. The salt department
could have been the basis for the production of poison gas. After the
German invasion, while I was in the Ukraine, I heard indirectly that part
of the plant was being used for war production but I did not hear anything
about what was being Made.
ENCLOSURE (A): Sketch of the Layout of the Kirov Synthetic Rubber'Faotory
With Legend
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CONFIDENTIAL/SECURfTY'INFORMATION
Enclosure (A)
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CONFIDENTIAL/SECURITY INFORMATION
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ENCLOSURE (A) CONFIDENTIAL/SECURITY INFORMATION
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(1) Twelve-foot high brick walls on both north and south sides.
(2) Metal screen fence 10-12 feet high topped with barbed vire.
(3) Brick or concrete wall 10-12 feet high. 27dOurce uncertain of east enclosure,
.regards this as the probabilityj
(4) Workers' exits. Under .24-hour guard by Russians, not Armenians.
(5) Administrative Offices. Three-story white plaster building.
(6) Executive Offices. Two-story white plaster building containing the private
offices of senior engineers and key administrative personnel. The larger
building (5) was commonly referred,to as the "Central Administrative Building".
Four-story building containing dormitories for single plant workers. The
west side of the building (shaded area) housed a machinist school for factory
personnel. The dormitory contained about 100 rooms occupied by eight to 10
persons each. Both male and female employees lived in the dormitory. There
wet� a cafeteria, laundry facilities etc in the building which was constructed
of some kind of tuff.
(7)
(8) Electrode Department. Three eight-hour shifts a day made solid cylinder
electrodes OUooal and coal produets measuring about 10 yards long and a little
over & yard in diameter. Each shift had 30 persons of which five were WOM411.
The building wee grey concrete turned black and grimy with smoke. Part of the
building was set aside for drying; the electrodes were hung from the ceiling
and dried for a month before being sent to the carbide department.
(9)
Carbide Department. There were four six-hour shifts
a day in thusdapartmint with a total of about 70 persons a shift. Six
large Swedish-type half-open stoves of heat-resistant ceramic were in the
department. Three electrodes produced by the electrode department were
used in each stove. Eleven men were assigned to each stove, and one man for
each two stoves had the Job of putting coal and calcium oxide into the stoves.
Other personnel in the department handled technical matters such as electricity
control and quality analysis. The liquid carbide dropped from the stoves into
small cars on rails for transfer to the cooling department. Higher wages
and shorter hours for the laborers in this department did not uompeneate them
for the appalling conditions. Temperatures near the stoves exceeded 0000 F
and the men sweated foam inside their inch-thick suits. Five years was as
long as [avow% could work on the stoves and the morale of theme workers was
vary Inv.
some of the stoves were often used for other purposes, mainly
in connection with the steel industry.
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(10) Cooling Department. The hardened carbide in two-ton blocks was lifted out
of the cars by cranes in this department and placed on metal rails to cool.
After four hours' cooling these blocks were again liftedtby cranes and trans-
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tarred to another section of the department where machines out them into half-
pound pieces. Elevators carried these oieces away and deposited them in bar-
rels which were then tightly covered!
was shipped out of the plant for use elsewhere, sitce,lectentivevnthetiorther
tion had not yet begun. The cooling department was staffed by 15 people it
each of three eight-hour shifts, Three or four of the workers were women.
(11) Calcium 0xide_Department. This unit of the plant had six large closed furnaces
about .15 meters high which prepared calcium oxide for the carbide department.
There were four men on each furnace and a total of 25 men on each of four
shifts a day.
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'ENCLOSURE (A):.
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CONFIDENTIAL/SECURITY INFORMATION
(12) Barrel Department. Three eight-hour shifts of 25 people, sue half of whom
were women, made the iron barrels in which the carbide was stored.
* (13) Electricity Transformation Department. This unit was under special security
regulations and I do not know anything about its output or the number and.
kinds of workers. Its function was to convert to lower Voltage the electric
power which ran the plant and which was brought from the Kanaker power plant
north of Erevan and 12 miles from the factory.
(14) Raw Materials Storehouse. There were 10 people on eache three eight-hour
shifts.
* (15) Acetylene Department. Produced acetylene gas.
* (1.6) Cleaning Department. Acetylene,gas made in the acetylene department was piped
into this department and cleaned by means of some 'chemical process which I
never learned about.
* (17) Reacting Department. fflource not certain of this namej After cleaning, the
gas was transformed into liquid acetylene in this department.
* (18) Absorption Department. A process concerning which I have no information was
used to clean the liquid acetylene.
* (19) Desorktion Department. A further cleaning process about which I am equally
Uninformed.
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* (20) CatalyzationRuamla. I know nothing about the operations of this depart-
ment except that it was here that the liquid was changed into viscous material
.by a process which' was the most closely guarded secret of the plant. I learned
from friends that there were five small laboratories in this department where"
highly technical functions were Performed under special guard.
* (21) Separation Department. In this department the viscous material was separated.
� into components or qualities referred to as alpha, beta, gamma and so on. ,
* (22) Benzol Department. This small department was an adjunct of the Separation
Department, the benzol presumably being prepared here for use in the separa-
tion process.
* (23) Refining Department, This was the end of the line. The raw synthetic rubber
emer�d from this department in pieces of various shapes and sizes and, at
that time, was being sent to Tbilisi where it would be made into finished
articles in Georgian factories, This was a cause of some discontent among
the Armenians who would have liked to have had rubber-products factories in
Armenia to augment the demand in that republic for industrial labor. Since
there seemed no logical economic reason for transporting the raw rubber to
Georgia, a move which obviously increased theenergy cost of the finished
manufactures, it was generally assumed that patina matters were involved.
I later heard, however, (I think it was while I was in DP camp in Germany
several years after the end of World War II) that the factory had begun mak-
ing automobile and truck tires,
* (24) Salt Department. I have put this department at the end since I do not know
where its function entered into the process. Its and, product was called
Somen by the Soviets who claimed to have invented either the process or the
compound., but which 1 believe is exactly the same thing an chloroprene made
from acetylene and hydrochloric acid. As I have indicated, this department is
of significance in connection with statements that the plant was readily con-
vertible to vvir production.
Under special guard and staffed by employees with special NXVD security
clearance,.
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