By Vestnik Kavkaza
March will mark the fifth anniversary of the death of the legendary Baku resident Nikolai Baibakov, who spearheaded the Soviet oil and gas industry, the champion of active work in the government of the USSR. His work experience extends from a petroleum engineer to deputy chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers and head of the State Planning Committee - he worked for 70 years, including 40 years in the highest state bodies.
In the early days of the war, the commissariat immediately began to recruit volunteers in the oil industry released from conscription to the army. And these were the young, women, senior citizens - tens of thousands of people. The task was facilitated by the fact that oil companies have already had experience of rapid and mass education, as well as the fact that in the first ranks there were volunteers who realized the importance of this industry during the war. In the tragic year of 1941 the Soviet oil industry was able to take a step forward. Baku oilmen met all government tasks in 1941 and gave the front 23.5 million tons of oil - an unprecedented figure in the history of the Baku oil industry.
The structure of the special staff created by the People's Commissariat for the Oil Industry led by Baibakov included representatives of the People's Commissariat of Defense and Glavneftesbyt. The staff held meetings virtually every day, analyzing information on the opportunities and needs of plants and requirements of the fronts, after which decisions were made to provide them with fuel. The importance of oil as a strategic raw material that could define the outcome of the war was understood by Hitler. The problem of fuel was the most important one for Germany. By the beginning of military operations it produced only 8.9 million tons of gasoline and diesel fuel, mainly coal. Germans did not have much oil, partly filling their needs from the deposits of allied Romania. But this was not enough; Hitler looked forward to capturing the Caucasian oil fields.
In the summer of 1942, Stalin called Baibakov, "Hitler declared that if he does not capture the Caucasian oil, he will lose the war. Everything must be done to ensure that the Germans did not get any drop of oil. Keep in mind, if you let the Germans get at least one ton of oil, we will shoot you dead. But if you destroy the industry too early so that the Germans will capture it, and we will be left without fuel, we will shoot you dead, too." "But you do not leave me a choice", Baibakov said. Stalin tapped his temple: "Here is the choice, Comrade Baibakov. Go. And think along with Budoynny how to resolve this issue".
So Baibakov was appointed Commissioner of the State Committee of Defense on the destruction of oil wells and refineries in the Caucasus region, and if necessary, in Baku, too. On the committee there was a team to conduct special operations in the oil fields of the North Caucasus. Baibakov decided that if the Germans approached the plants, they should be dismantled and removed to the east of the country with all valuable equipment, marginal wells should immediately be disabled, and the main wells should be used to the last critical moment, and under the most extreme circumstances they also would be destroyed.
The group for special operations under Baibakov included petroleum engineers and powdermen of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, who developed the technology of destruction and long-term preservation of the wells. All the preparations to destroy the fields should be implemented only with the knowledge of the staff of the Southern Front. Baibakov was told that the staff and the front commander Budyonny, when Rostov-on-Don surrendered, were located in Armavir, and he hastened to fly there on board a U-2. From the top he saw a terrible picture of retreat. Villages were burned, on the roads and byways the Soviet army was retreating - sparse columns, scattered groups, or a crowd along with the refugees. When the plane began to land in Armavir, Baibakov saw German armor on the ground.
"Semyon Mikhailovich, start the special operations!" - he cried when he saw Budyonny. "Do not hurry. My cavalry stopped the tanks," the front commander tried to calm him down. Baibakov recalled Stalin's "here is the choice", and the decision had to be taken by himself. It was clear that if the Germans were not stopped, they would take the Krasnodar industries intact, and, getting fuel for their vehicles, rush to the Volga and the Caucasus. From the front headquarters Baibakov gave the order to oil workers to start the immediate destruction of wells, and sat down in the car and rushed to the industries. Work developed close by the Germans, who came to the village, where the area of the oil fields of the Krasnodar Territory extended to the east. The Absheron power plant had already been blown up under machine-gun fire of the enemy.
People had to destroy what they had built by themselves, doing their best and considering this to be a matter of life. When the first oil pumping and compressor stations were blown up, oil workers did not hide their tears. Until August 1942, about 600 wagons with equipment were sent to the East of the country, all the oil extracted in recent days was taken to the area of Grozny, but the Germans were advancing, and people had to destroy more and more plants. Anyway, the main task of Stalin was carried out - in Kuban the enemy did not receive a single drop of fuel. Later it became known that in Germany a Joint Stock Company "German Oil in the Caucasus" had already been established, but during six months of German occupation of Kuban the specialists in oil production who arrived there from Germany could not restore a single well.
To be continued
