gard the importation of modern equipment and foreign 

 know-how as an active force to improve the function- 

 ing of the Soviet economy and to accelerate its tech- 

 nological modernization, and no longer as just a sub- 

 sidiary source for supplementing domestic produc- 

 tion. 1 ^ 5 



The USSR is entering the world market to supply as 

 well as to acquire advanced technology. Increased 

 imports of technology have generated the need to ex- 

 pand Soviet export capacity in order to raise revenue 

 to pay for imports. Soviet leaders are also con- 

 vinced that they will be at a disadvantage until they 

 succeed in selling substantial amounts of machinery 

 and equipment to Western countries, in addition to 

 the raw materials and fuels which now make up the 

 bulk of Soviet exports. 12 6 



Thus, the decision to borrow and the types of tech- 

 nology imported are heavily influenced by foreign ex- 

 change considerations. The oil and gas industry, for 

 example, has been one of the largest users of bor- 

 rowed technology, and Campbell notes that "part of 

 the rationale must surely be the combination of an 

 urgent pressure to expand output with a realization 

 that this expansion of output itself generates the 

 foreign exchange. "127 Similarly, in the coal indus- 

 try, he adds, recent decisions to import power shov- 

 els and large vehicles for open pit mining appear to 

 be strongly motivated by their role in assisting in 

 the expansion of exports. Other foreign equipment 

 and machinery, like automotive technology and some 

 computer-based systems, are acquired in part, it ap- 

 pears, to increase Soviet capacity for producing high 

 quality manufactured goods saleable on world markets. 

 On still another level, foreign trade considerations 

 are also important in determining some of the priori- 

 ty S&T problems. One of the recent 250 basic prob- 

 lems, for example, focused on the development of su- 

 per tankers with a capacity of more than 100,000 tons 



Finally, it may be noted that Soviet policy on 

 technology transfer has itself undergone change in 

 recent years. Authorities have come increasingly to 

 realize that effective transfer requires a broad, 



153 



