Great Break (USSR) in the context of "Industrialization in the Soviet Union"

The Great Break (Russian: Великий перелом), also called the Great Turn, was the radical change in the economic policy of the USSR from 1928 to 1929, primarily consisting of the process by which the New Economic Policy (NEP) of 1921 was abandoned in favor of the acceleration of collectivization and industrialization and also a cultural revolution. The term came from the title of Joseph Stalin's article "Year of the Great Turn: Toward the 12th Anniversary of October" («Год великого перелома: к XII годовщине Октября») published on 7 November 1929, the 12th anniversary of the October Revolution. David R. Marples argues that the era of the Great Break lasted until 1934.

One of the factors that directly contributed to the Great Break was the war scare of 1926–27. Because Stalin and other senior leaders believed in the imminent threat of a Western invasion (particularly from the British Empire and Poland), they decided that the gradualism of the NEP years had to be replaced by a fast-paced policy, aiming to transform the country into an industrial powerhouse with a strong military.