In this Byzantine court of intrigue and counter-intrigue, ... [t]he Quest for meaning and legitimacy became an all-consuming concern, and the technical problems of practical modernization degenerated into squabbles for influence and prestige, between the various groups Stalin balanced against each other. It is fascinating to read such documents as Khrushchev's memoirs in this perspective.  Since the Ukraine was Khrushchev's fiefdom, he was responsible for combatting the famine after the last War. The situation worsened, and Kaganóvich was sent from Moscow to "help him" (a clear threat to Khrushchev's position). On one occasion he visited a kolkhóz which practiced a method of "shallow plowing": 
“One has to know Kaganóvich to imagine how he must have roared at the chairman of this collective: 'Why the hell do you plough so shallowly?'  Mogíl'chenko, who knew his stuff, answered: 'I plough the way I should.' Kaganóvich snapped: 'If you plough like that, you'll end up having to beg the government for bread.'  'Not I, comrade Kaganóvich, not I,' Mogíl'chenko proudly replied. 'I've never asked the state for a crumb ...'  A year later I expressly went to meet this Mogíl'chenko. His kolkhóz was one of the best in the country... All this alarmed Kaganóvich greatly. That's why he said to me: 'I'm afraid this Mogíl'chenko is going to achieve good harvests with the shallow method.'  I should mention that Kaganóvich was personally interested in discrediting Mogíl'chenko; he had a stake in the campaign against the adherents of the shallow soil-processing method.  People who used the method were actually court-martialled and in some instances [sic!] even condemned to death. Shallow soil-processing had been declared 'illegal'. The theory was developed by a professor in Sarátov, who was later punished. I think they jailed him or worse. (Khrushchev 1971, p.225) 
Stalin could not be challenged, but each lieutenant strove to increase his power in his own fiefdom, and to control information between it and the leader. Often, as in this example, they would sacrifice all bureaucratic rationality for the purpose of defending their domain. Stalin himself was stood alone at the center of the web, controlling all vital decisions, keeping information of national importance from even his closest advisors. In latter years he hardly moved from his narrow Moscow circuit, where all threads converged. Within this narrow circle he was the master of shadows and subterfuge, ruling by informal and unstructured manipulation of deadly subtleties:  "I doubt that there has ever existed a leader in a similarly responsible position who has wasted more time than Stalin did, simply sitting at the dinner table, eating and drinking," remarks Khrushchev with endearing naiveté.  Milovan Djilas, a subtler nature, dispels this impression: 
“There were no set rules for which members of the Politburo or others in high positions were to be present at these dinners.  The participants were usually people who worked on projects that at the time were in the foreground, or concerned some specific guest. The circle was clearly very limited, and it was a great honor to be invited... Such a dinner usually lasts six hours or more – from ten at night to four or five in the morning... In reality, much of Soviet policy was decided at these dinners. (1962, p.64-70)