"We never make mistakes"

This volume contains two short novels, An Incident at Krechetovka Station and For the Good of the Cause, which examine the moral failures within Soviet bureaucracy. The first story follows Lieutenant Zotov, a dedicated railway officer who turns over a stranded actor to the secret police because the man fails to recognize the new name of a renamed city. The second narrative focuses on a technical school where students and teachers lose their newly constructed building to a government research institute through an arbitrary administrative seizure. These stories document how suspicion and ideological conformity override individual logic and communal hard work.

Students of Russian history and political philosophy read these texts to understand how systemic rigidity functions on a local level. The stories provide a window into the tension between personal conscience and party loyalty during the Khrushchev era. Readers walk away with a clear view of how institutional self-interest produces injustice even when characters believe they are acting for the collective benefit. The book serves as a case study in how small-scale administrative decisions enforce a culture of fear and obedience across a society.