Development of mobilization planning system for railway transport in the northwest of the USSR

The history of the mobilization preparation of the Soviet northwestern railways in the 1920s remains poorly studied. Railways were the key mode of transport in this region, played a crucial role in organizing the transit of goods and economic development, and in wartime conditions ensured an uninterrupted supply of equipment and reinforcements to the army. This article is aimed at examining the process of developing a mobilization planning system for railway transport in the northwest of the USSR in the 1920s. In the course of the study, materials from regional and federal archives, regulatory legal acts, and periodicals were involved. The methodological basis of the article is the use of historical-systemic and historical-genetic methods, as well as some elements of the content analysis and the semiotic approach. The paper shows that the railways of the northwest of the USSR played a significant role in Soviet mobilization planning. It is explained by the significant strategic importance of the region, as well as the need to restore the railway transport located there, which became one of the theaters of military operations in the Civil War. In this regard, applications from the railways of the northwest of the USSR had the highest percentage of approval when forming the evacuation plan of 1928. At the same time, the task of developing the northwestern railways of the USSR was not a priority for the country’s military and political leadership in the 1920s due to the secondary importance of the threat from Finland.