[2] The Council of Ministers, under Stalin's leadership, spearheaded the implementation of the fourth five-year plan of economic development spanning 1946 to 1950.

Stalin's directive on February 9, 1946, emphasized the restoration of war-affected regions, the resurgence of industry and agriculture to pre-war levels, and the subsequent transition to a more expansive or significantly reduced growth rate.

[4] In October 1948, the Council of Ministers and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union outlined a comprehensive plan for windbreak planting, crop rotation pastures, and the construction of ponds and lakes[5] The plan, known as the Great Plan for the Transformation of Nature,[6] also aimed at ensuring high crop yields in the steppe and forest-steppe regions of the European territories of the Soviet Union.

[7] The Soviet Union successfully developed the atomic bomb on August 29, 1949, becoming the world's second nuclear-armed nation.

This achievement brought an end to the American nuclear monopoly, marking a turning point in the global balance of power.